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Turkey's Energy Transition: Hydro-Carbons or Low-Carbons

Document Cited in Related
Vincent
Published date01 February 2020
Date01 February 2020
DOI10.3366/gels.2020.0010
Pages114-121
GENERAL OVERVIEW

Turkey is a key transit hub between Asia and Europe. The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline is the most important transit route for oil reserves flowing from the Caspian region to Western markets via Turkey's Black Sea ports, while the Ceyhan segment of the pipeline is a significant transit point for oil flowing from Northern Iraq. Besides oil, Turkey is also a key transfer point in the flow of natural gas Westward. Currently, seven natural gas pipelines have been built or under construction; The Russia-Turkey Natural Gas Pipeline (West Line), the Blue Stream Gas Pipeline, the Eastern Anatolian Natural Gas Main Transmission Line (Iran-Turkey Line), the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum Natural Gas Pipeline (BTE), the Turkey-Greece Gas Interconnection (ITG), the Trans-Anatolia Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP), and the Turkstream Gas Pipeline.1

Turkey's position as a primary transit hub in the region is not solely the result of its geographical placement, but also the dynamics of Turkey's internal market consumption, which has seen constant growth over the last couple of decades.2

Map of Gas Pipelines in Turkey3

Turkey's internal market energy consumption by years5

Furthermore, Turkey's energy market has much diversified in terms of resources reserved for internal usage. Hydrocarbon resources have the largest share in electricity production, followed by hydro-electric power, and renewable energy sources.6 However, according to 2019 data from the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources, the distribution of the country's energy basket shows that 31,4% is hydraulic, 28,6% natural gas, 22,4% coal, 8,1% wind, 1,6% geothermal, 6,2% solar and 1,7% from other sources.7 Based on these figures, Turkey's aims in terms of lowering the rate of hydrocarbons used in electricity production every year can be achievable.

 MARKET STRUCTURE AND ORGANIZATION

The energy sector has its own diversity amongst the institutions based on their energy types and legal powers. Fundamentally, the structure of the Turkish energy market has a liberal model. Both public institutions and private actors have influenced the market. The Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources (Ministry of Energy) is the chief policy-maker in terms of the public sphere, while the Energy Market Regulatory Authority (known as the EPDK) has a full regulatory power and control over suppliers downstream in the energy market, except for regarding nuclear energy activities. In other words, the Ministry of Energy is the main policy maker, while the EPDK is the key for the legal and regulatory matters, as well as the economic terms of the energy market.

The third public authority, established relatively recently,8 is the Nuclear Power Regulatory Authority. The Nuclear Power Regulatory Authority's power is limited to nuclear power activities, however, given that the authority to regulate the energy market is attributed to the EPDK more broadly, it would not be wrong to expect possible run-ins between the nuclear power authority and the EPDK in the future.

Besides these three authorities, the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization (Ministry of Environment) and the Public Procurement Authority (PPA) are two significant...

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