Azerbaijan is considering an electricity export route through the Zangezur corridor and Nakhchivan to Turkiye, where private consortia estimate that demand in the western part of the country, particularly around Istanbul, could reach about 1 gigawatt.
Azerbaijani Deputy Energy Minister Orkhan Zeynalov announced the estimate at COP31, Vesti Baku reported. He said a Nakhchivan-Erzurum-Istanbul route could be commercially promising, although the project’s final parameters and investment decision have not been approved.
Two Routes Toward European Markets
The proposed route through Nakhchivan is separate from the Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkiye-Bulgaria corridor covered by an intergovernmental agreement signed by the four countries on Nov. 10.
The 1 GW estimate refers to potential demand in Turkiye and is not an approved transmission capacity for the line.
Baku is also working on the Caspian-Black Sea-Europe green energy corridor through Georgia, Romania and Hungary. A feasibility study has been completed, and the participants are aiming for a final investment decision in 2028 or 2029 and the launch of a first 1.3 GW line in 2032.
Azerbaijan’s Energy Ministry has said the corridor’s total capacity should gradually reach 4 GW. From 2040, it could potentially deliver about 20 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity to Europe each year. Those figures remain targets and depend on financing and final decisions by the participating countries.
Connecting Power Systems From Central Asia to Europe
Baku is also studying a link between the power systems of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan through a submarine cable across the Caspian Sea.
The electricity could later be carried along complementary routes toward Europe, including across the Black Sea and through Nakhchivan and Turkiye.
The proposed network is part of Azerbaijan’s broader effort to develop renewable-energy production and become a transit hub for electricity generated in the Caspian and Central Asian regions.