OREANDA-NEWS. August 20, 2010. SOCAR Vice President Elshad Nasirov formally handed over the canister of gas to U.S. Montana State University professor Thomas C. Goltz. Consequently, New Silk Road – Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey-Europe Odyssey by Thomas C. Goltz envisaging delivery of massive quantities of gas to the European Union from the Shahdeniz Two Project launched.

The canister of gas will be carried to Istanbul by a group of American, Azeri and Turkish students who have come together to pioneer a route Azerbaijan will take to reach European markets. The U.S. students who are accompanying Goltz are students of the region who participated in Professor Goltz’s class, simulating the Black Sea Economic Cooperation.

The expedition will last three weeks. The canister will be ceremonially presented to the SOCAR office as a symbol of Azerbaijani determination to launch major gas exports to the European Union in the last quarter of 2016. Professor Thomas C. Goltz 10 years earlier carried the first barrel of oil from Baku to Cheyhan along the then yet to be developed BTC pipeline project.