Turkey to become a strategic oil corridor

Speaking at the 31st Ambrosetti Forum held in Italy on Friday, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that Turkey's energy strategy was clear: to create a corridor between countries with rich energy sources and those who consume it. Turkey intends to make use of its geostrategic position in the global oil market. The Ceyhan terminal looks set to become a major centre for energy distribution as tankers can load from there and transport oil easily to both the West and East."Making Ceyhan terminal an energy trade center, realizing Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum (BTE) and the Caspian natural gas projects, will make Turkey the fourth main natural gas artery of the EU are our main strategies,'' said the PM. "After the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline becomes operational at the end of November, one of every 16 barrels of oil will be transported to world energy markets via Turkey. And, I think this figure underlines Turkey's importance for global energy supply security,'' added Erdogan. Another dimension of Turkey's energy strategy was the Blue Stream natural gas pipeline which would transport gas to Ceyhan terminal to be exported to third countries, said Erdogan. Turkey is also carrying out studies on alternative energies currently in the areas of hydroelectric, wind, geothermal, and solar energy projects. ''Turkey also carries out search and development studies regarding alternative energy resources like hydrogen, and actively takes part in international cooperation projects. On the other hand, I would like to stress that Turkey is also discussing nuclear energy. In this context, we plan to build three nuclear power plants till 2015, create a capacity of 4,500 MW and increase the share of nuclear energy in our overall energy resources to 6 percent,'' indicated Erdogan.Â