Iraq-Turkey pipeline capacity utilization

Turkey wants an Iraq-Turkey oil pipeline to operate at maximum capacity once it resumes flows through Turkey's Ceyhan, Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar was quoted as saying by the state-owned Anadolu news agency on Sunday.

The pipeline was halted by Turkey in March 2023 after the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) ordered Ankara to pay Baghdad US$1.5 billion in damages for unauthorized exports between 2014 and 2018.

Turkey has said since late 2023 that it is ready to resume operations at the pipeline, carrying oil exports from the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region. Bayraktar told Reuters last month that Ankara had not received confirmation on resuming flows.

On Friday, eight international oil firms operating in Iraq's Kurdistan region said they would not resume oil exports through Turkey's Ceyhan despite an announcement from Baghdad that the restart was imminent.

"This pipeline has been ready for 1.5 years already. We want the Turkey-Iraq pipeline, especially the two pipelines of 650 km from our Silopi to Ceyhan to be used," Bayraktar said.

"We want some of the oil passing through this line to go to the refinery in Kirikkale, and also via ships through Ceyhan, to refineries in Turkey or to different refineries in the world, so that the capacity of the line can be used at the maximum level," he added.

Bayraktar also said a planned trade route project involving Turkey and Iraq, dubbed the Development Road Project, included the construction of a pipeline reaching the Persian Gulf for the Iraqi oil flows to go to global markets via Turkey.

 

Iraq: Basrah-Aqaba oil pipeline face bleak outlook

Iraqi aspirations to move ahead with a long-planned crude pipeline from Basrah to Aqaba in Jordan have been dealt a major blow after the head of a powerful Shia military group in Iraq said the project will never happen.

"Jordanians must know their battle is doomed for failure. The Basrah-Aqaba oil pipeline will never be," said Ali al-Asadi, head of Iraq's Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba (HaN). "Let them try and they shall witness what happens to them and whoever collaborates with them."

HaN is known for its extremely close ties with Iran. Al-Asadi issued the statement after Iraqi lawmaker Mustafa Jabbar Sanad revealed that Jordanian officials — including the speaker of parliament, the Jordanian king's advisor and the head of intelligence — had met with senior Iraqi Shia, Sunni and Kurdish officials and agreed on the pipeline's implementation.

Sanad is a member of the pro-Iran Shia Co-ordination Framework group and was behind a lawsuit against the federal government in Baghdad over monthly payments to the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).

Iraq's speaker of parliament Mohammed al-Halbousi said on January 14, 2023 that the Basrah-Aqaba pipeline will see the light, following a meeting with his Jordanian counterpart Ahmad Al-Safadi during an official four-day visit to Iraq.

Al-Halbousi said the project will be executed as soon as the new government in Baghdad overcomes certain obstacles, not least the high cost of the pipeline.

Baghdad's most recent estimate is that the project will not exceed US$8.5 billion, down from its previous estimate of below US$9 billion.

Costs and financing have been major barriers for the project for several years, with both Iraq and Jordan looking for ways to cut expenses.

The proposed pipeline consists of two sections. A 2 million barrels/day capacity line extending from Basrah to Haditha near the Syrian border would transport crude to Iraqi refineries and power stations. A second one million barrels/day pipeline would extend from Haditha to Aqaba in northern Jordan.