Operatorship of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) export oil pipeline passes from BP Exploration (Caspian Sea) Limited to the subsidiary of the State Oil Company of the Azerbaijani Republic (SOCAR), SOCAR Midstream Operations (SMO), from July 1, 2026, BTC Co said in a statement.
“The transfer of operatorship covers all three parts of the BTC oil pipeline – in Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey,” the statement said.
In addition, the management of BTC pipeline activities and operatorship of common activities relating to both the BTC and South Caucasus Pipeline (SCP) systems, currently undertaken by BP, will also transfer to SMO,” it said.
“This transition is in line with the relevant agreements underpinning the BTC project and concluded as part of the final readiness decision. The scope of the transfer includes all dedicated BTC facilities and activities, as well as BTC/SCP joint activities across the three countries, excluding those located within the Sangachal terminal. Operatorship of the Sangachal terminal remains unchanged and will continue under BP. The shareholding structure of BTC Co. also remains unchanged,” the company said.
BP remains the operator of the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli (ACG) and Shah Deniz fields, as well as other upstream projects in the Caspian, including the Karabagh field development, the ADUA and Shafag-Asiman exploration projects.
Earlier, and as provided for under the relevant agreements, effective June 8, 2026, the Western Route Export Pipeline (WREP) facilities in Azerbaijan and Georgia were returned to the entities acting on behalf of the Governments of Azerbaijan (SMO) and Georgia (the Georgian Oil and Gas Corporation – GOGC).
SOCAR Midstream Gas Operations LLC (SOCAR MGO) has been the commercial operator of SCP since 2015 and the technical operator since 2021.
The 1,768 km BTC was designed to export crude oil from the Caspian to the Mediterranean. The current throughput capacity of BTC is 1 million barrels of oil per day.
To date, BTC has carried a total of more than 4.7 billion barrels (about 630 million tonnes) of crude oil.
The BTC pipeline currently carries mainly ACG crude oil and Shah Deniz condensate from Azerbaijan. In addition, other volumes of Caspian regional crude oil and condensate (Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, other SOCAR volumes produced in Azerbaijan) continue to be transported via BTC.
The shareholders of BTC Co. are BP (30.1%), SOCAR (32.97%), Hungary’s MOL (8.9%), Turkey’s TPAO (6.53%), Italy’s ENI and France’s TotalEnergies (5% each), Japan’s Itochu (3.4%), the U.S. company ExxonMobil and Japan’s INPEX (2.5% each), and India’s ONGC Videsh (3.1%).
