Kazakhstan weighs Azerbaijan routes as alternative to CPC oil exports

Kazakhstan is considering alternative routes through Azerbaijan for exporting its oil as instability continues to affect the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC), the country’s Ministry of Energy said.

The options include the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline, the Baku-Supsa route and transit across the Caspian Sea through Azerbaijan, according to Interfax-Kazakhstan, Caliber.Az reports via local media.

Kazakhstan has already been increasing its use of the BTC route. KazMunayGas (KMG), the country’s national oil and gas company, plans to raise oil exports through the pipeline by 31% in 2026 from the previous year, reaching 1.7 million tonnes.

Some 704,000 tonnes of Kazakh oil were transported through the port of Aktau towards the BTC pipeline during the first six months of 2026.

The 1,768 km BTC pipeline runs from Azerbaijan through Georgia to Türkiye and has an annual capacity of more than 50 million tonnes of oil.

The project is jointly owned by several international energy companies, including Azerbaijan’s SOCAR, BP, Hungary’s MOL, Türkiye’s TPAO, Italy’s Eni, France’s TotalEnergies, Japan’s Itochu and INPEX, India’s ONGC Videsh and US-based ExxonMobil.

By Aghakazim Guliyev