By Nigel Chamberlain, NATO Watch
NATO set up a 12,000 kilometre pipeline system to supply its forces with fuel during the Cold War and is still in use today. With a storage capacity of 5.5 million cubic metres in ten locations, the NATO Pipeline System (NPS) runs through 13 countries to military air bases, civil airports, pumping stations, truck and rail loading stations, refineries and entry/discharge points.
The NPS is funded by the NATO Security Investment Programme and overseen by the Petroleum Committee which, in turn, reports to the Logistics Committee.
According to an unnamed source in the Turkish Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources, the 3,000 kilometre long Turkish section of the NPS is going to be opened for civilian use. The objective is to undermine oil smuggling by considerably decreasing the use of oil tanker trucks on the roads where it is more vulnerable.
Turkey has been holding discussions with the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) inside Iraq about purchasing their oil to offset decreasing crude and gas flow from Iran due to international sanctions imposed on the Islamic republic. Chevron, the US oil company announced last July that it had signed an agreement with Iraqi Kurds to explore for oil in their northern region, against the wishes of the Iraqi central government which wants to control the area’s oil wealth.
Turkey is dependent on imports for 91 per cent of its oil and has relied heavily on Iran and Russia for its supplies. Ankara has reluctantly complied with United States and European Union demands to reduce imports from Iran as part of a new round of sanctions. If the discussions with the KRG result in an agreement, Turkey will build production and pipeline capacity inside Kurdistan.
The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Pipeline Project (BTC) carries oil extracted from the Caspian Sea coast to the western markets through a pipeline via Turkey, thus placing the NATO Member State right in the middle of an energy network which involves most of the regional oil projects.