Caspian pipeline geopolitics : Competition between Western and Northern oil and gas transport routes to Europe

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F00216224%3A14230%2F19%3A00111950" target="_blank" >RIV/00216224:14230/19:00111950 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://www.ca-c.org/journal/2019/journal_eng/cac-04/07.shtml" target="_blank" >https://www.ca-c.org/journal/2019/journal_eng/cac-04/07.shtml</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

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Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Caspian pipeline geopolitics : Competition between Western and Northern oil and gas transport routes to Europe

Original language description

Since ancient times, the Caspian region has been known for its energy resources, which attracted the attention of the leading world players. The struggle for control over hydrocarbon resources intensified after the collapse of the U.S.S.R. The new independent states—Azerbai-jan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan were rich in energy resources, but economically weak, and became a target for Russia and the Western countries, which used their oil and gas companies to seek control over the hydrocarbon reserves of the new states and influence the oil and gas sectors of the economies of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. The second stage of the competition was the struggle for control over oil and gas export routes from the Caspian region to world markets. The fact is that initially the newly independent states had no other way to transport hydrocarbons, except to the north—through Russian territory. These pipelines were inherited from the Soviet Union; there were simply no others available at the beginning of the 1990s. Having thus become heavily dependent on Moscow, the new Caspian region states began to work on creating alternative routes, one of which was the western route—from Azerbaijan through Georgia to Turkey and then to Europe. In 1998-2018, two oil pipelines and one gas pipeline were built in the western direction, which were subsequently expanded and modernized in order to increase capacity. As a result, a feud broke out between the two main routes for delivering Caspian oil and gas to Europe and to world markets: the northern and western routes. The northern route is being lobbied by Russia, the western—by the U.S., EU, and Turkey. Accordingly, depending on geopolitical preferences and the degree of dependence on one or another world locus of power, supporters of the northern and western routes were identified among the new countries of the Caspian. Thus, Azerbaijan has clearly come to support the western route, Kazakhstan—the northern one, and Turkmenistan has not yet made its decision, preferring to export gas along the northern route, and oil—along the western one. This article compares the strengths and weaknesses of both routes and the influence of geopolitics on the choices made by Baku, Nur-Sultan, and Ashghabad for exporting their hydrocarbons to Europe.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_SC - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the SCOPUS database

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

50601 - Political science

Project

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Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2019

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Central Asia and the Caucasus

ISSN

1404-6091

e-ISSN

1404-6091

Volume of the periodical

20

Issue of the periodical within the volume

4

Country of publishing house

SE - SWEDEN

Number of pages

12

Pages from-to

70-81

UT code for WoS article

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EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85076881719