EAST-WEST CORRIDOR ENERGY CONTRIBUTES TO PRESERVATION OF THE TURKISH STRAITS' ECOLOGY
Khakki Akil, Deputy General Director of the Department of Energy, Environment and Water Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkey
Today I would like to focus on the environmental impacts of energy transport on the Black Sea and the Turkish Straits. The Turkish Straits and the Black Sea have become all the more important for the maritime transportation and trade following the emergence of new independent states in the Black Sea Region, the Caucasus and Central Asia.
The newly discovered oil reserves in the Caspian and the need to transport this oil to western markets have placed the Black Sea and the Turkish Straits presented the commercialy viable option for the transportation of Caspian oil.
The Black Sea:
The Black Sea plays a vital role in the lives of the six coastal nations. As a result of rapidly increasing maritime traffic, the Black Sea environment is under great pressure.
The Caspian Pipeline Consortium fulfils the export to Novorossiysk Seaport has undergone some reconstruction, adding more storage facilities for oil and petrochemicals.
As a result, the port's potential for oil export has increased to nearly 50 million tons a year. Oil also is being exported from the Tuapse and the Odessa seaports. 1999 figures are about 5 million tons for Tuapse and 10 million tons of oil for Odessa. Add to this amount the oil which may come from the North, through a possible reverse operation of the Odessa-Brody oil pipeline.
Thus the figures are grim not only for the environmental safety of the Black Sea, but also for the Turkish Straits which are one of the most difficult, crowded and dangerous waterways to navigate.
The Turkish Straits:
The Strait of Istanbul runs right across the city of Istanbul, declared as a "World Heritage" by UNESCO, with nearly 15 million inhabitants. The vessels carrying dangerous cargo regularly approach as close as 50 meters to the inhabited areas. The Strait of Istanbul is also one of the rarest marine biological corridors of the world. It is a genetic bridge for marine life between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean.
Since the signing of the Montreux Convention, establishing the regime of the Turkish Straits in 1936, the number of vessels passing through the Straits has increased 11 times while their total tonnage has increased 25 times. For instance, while in the whole year of 1938 only 4500 vessels passed through the Straits, today this figure is around 50.000.
The ratio of oil, oil products and other dangerous and hazardous materials transported by large tankers has been rapidly increasing.
Daily internal vessel movement alone in the Strait of Istanbul is more than 2500. This figure does not include the movement of transiting ships, leisure crafts and fishing vessels. More than 2.5 million people are daily on the move at sea by intra-city ferries and other shuttle boats, crossing from one side to the other in Istanbul.
Currently, more than 5500 large tankers transporting oil, LPG or other dangerous material pass through the Turkish Straits out of 50.000 vessels per year. Over 100 million tons material are transported through the Straits. More than 150 vessels navigate through the Strait of Istanbul daily, 14 of which are oil tankers. This means a vessel passing at every 10 minutes.
Environmental impacts on the Black Sea and the Turkish Straits:
The increasing of size and tonnage of the vessels, have sharply increased the risk of maritime accidents in the Straits which could have grave consequences in terms of ecological, environmental and physical disasters. The dense maritime traffic in the Black Sea and the Turkish Straits and the consequent marine pollution, have already severely affected the environment. There is a significant decrease in the number and the variety of the surface and subsurface fish in the Straits and the Black Sea, mainly bluefish, mackerel, fauna and swordfish.
Due to the pollution mainly stemming from maritime traffic, this sensitive echo-system is now facing the threat of destabilization. Consequently, most of the fish species are on the verge of extinction.
A collision or an environmental disaster will force the closure of the Straits for unpredictable periods as it happened several times in the past, which would affect the economics of the Black Sea countries, as well as land locked Caucasian and Central Asian States.
In this context, I would like to recall the accident of an oil tanker ERIKA in December 1999 off the Atlantic coast, which caused 10.000 tons of oil spill into the sea, polluting 400 kilometers of coastline. Following the accident, European Commission and France, whose coasts were badly polluted by the oil spill, have proposed several radical measures to strengthen shipping safety regulations. Also the recent accident of the oil tanker "Prestige" in November 2003.
In view of these facts, Turkey strongly believes that the Black Sea-Turkish Straits route is not a viable and acceptable option for the transportation of oil or dangerous and hazardous products.
East-West Energy Corridor:
The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan crude oil pipeline project, the main component of the East-West Energy Corridor, derived from Turkey's environmental concerns related to the maritime route. Thus the starting point for this project was the protection of the environment.
Subsequent to the completion of the detailed engineering works on Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan named after Heydar Aliyev started on 19 June 2001 following the positive results of the basic engineering works, the BTC Crude Oil Pipeline project has entered as of 10 September 2002 "the land acquisition and construction phase", which is to last 32 months. The first tanker to carry Caspian oil is to be loaded from Ceyhan in the first half of 2005.
The BTC pipeline, by-passing the Black Sea and the Turkish Straits, will help to limit the environmental damage related both to the Black Sea and the Turkish Straits, will contribute to the physical security of Istanbul with its 15 million population and world cultural heritage. Also much has been achieved during the last months with regards to the other major component of the East-West Energy Corridor: the Shah Deniz natural gas project.
The consortium members gave their green light for the development of the Shah Deniz field and the construction of the South Caucasus Natural Gas Pipeline. This will constitute the first leg of the Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline which will carry the Turkmen gas to Western markets.
The Azeri natural gas is expected to reach the Turkish border in the third quarter of the year 2006.
As another important development, on 23 February 2003 an intergovermental agreement was signed between Turkey and Greece with regards to the interconnection of the natural gas network systems of the two countries and the transport of Caspian natural gas to European markets through the Turkey-Greece Interconnector. The implementation of the East-West Energy Corridor not only will contribute to the environmental safety of both the Black Sea and the Turkish Straits, but will also help Turkey becoming a crucial partner for Europe with regards to energy supply diversification.