The European Union expects the volume of Azerbaijani gas supplies to Europe via the Southern Gas Corridor (SGC) to reach the planned level of 10 billion cu m in the near future, European Commissioner for Energy Kadri Simson said, TASS reported.

Her remarks came during a press conference of the ministerial meeting of the South Gas Corridor Advisory Council on Friday.

She said that expectations of the European gas market are being studied.

She estimates that the level of 10 billion cubic meters of gas supply to Europe could be reached by the summer.

Azerbaijan began commercial deliveries of gas to Europe via the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), part of the Southern Gas Corridor (SGC), on 31 December, 2020. The 25-year pipeline will annually export more than 10 billion cubic meters of Azerbaijani gas to the European market. 8 billion cubic meters of the latter will be delivered to Italy and 1 billion cubic meters to Greece and Bulgaria.

The SGC, which stretches 3,500 km from Baku to the south of Italy via Georgia, Turkey, Greece and Albania, is an integrated system of pipelines, including also South Caucasus and Transanatolian gas pipelines. Its throughput capacity is 16 billion cubic meters of gas. The Shah Deniz field with reserves of 1.2 trillion cubic meters is considered the main source of raw materials for the SGC.