Turkey to conduct new oil explorations in Black Sea

Alparslan Bayraktar/X

Turkey will undertake three hydrocarbon explorations in the Black Sea this year, the country’s energy and natural resources minister, Alparslan Bayraktar, has confirmed.

“One of the goals in the vision of 2053 is to end Turkey’s energy dependency. This is such a great goal that it will affect the face of Turkey and the future of all of us,” Daily Sabah, an English news outlet in Turkey, reported, citing the minister’s speech in Istanbul.

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“We need to explore and produce oil, natural gas, and coal. If you have mines, gold, copper, and zinc, we need to explore and produce them,” Bayraktar said.

Over the years, Ankara has significantly increased its hydrocarbon explorations in the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean. The Black Sea natural gas field has a capacity of 710 billion cubic metres.

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Bayraktar said Turkey will increase domestic resource exploration to reduce dependency on energy imports. The expected exploration drills in Şırnak and Hakkari provinces will lead to discoveries, he said.

The minister said he also expected to commission the first reactor in the Mersin nuclear power plant on the southern Mediterranean coastline this year.

With a total installed capacity of 4,800 megawatts and an estimated cost of $20 billion, the nuclear plant is slated for full operational readiness by 2028.

The Akkuyu nuclear power plant, built by Russia’s state atomic energy company, Rosatom, will have four reactors and will supply 10 percent of Turkey’s electricity consumption, Bayraktar said.