In the first quarter of 2026, bp and its co-venturers spent about $134 million in operating expenditure and about $363 million in capital expenditure on ACG activities, the company said in its report for the first quarter of 2026.
ACG participating interests are: bp (operator - 30.37%), SOCAR (35.30%), MOL (9.57%), INPEX (9.31%), ExxonMobil (6.79%), TPAO (5.73%), ONGC Videsh (2.92%).
BP Exploration (Caspian Sea) Limited is the operator on behalf of the Contractor Parties to the ACG Production Sharing Agreement.
During the quarter, the 4D high-definition ocean bottom node seismic programme on ACG progressed with processing of the data acquired in 2025.
Offshore operations as part of the multi-well subsea intervention campaign in the Deepwater Gunashli area also continued. The first subsea intervention job within the campaign has now been successfully completed, and the data gathered enabled the well to safely return to injection service.
During the quarter, ACG continued to safely and reliably deliver stable production. Total ACG production for the quarter was on average about 325,000 barrels per day (b/d) (about 29 million barrels or 4 million tonnes in total) from the Chirag (19,500 b/d), Central Azeri (89,800 b/d), West Azeri (74,800 b/d), East Azeri (43,900 b/d), Deepwater Gunashli (47,700 b/d), West Chirag (22,600 b/d) and ACE (26,700 b/d) platforms.
At the end of the first quarter, 149 oil wells were producing, while 50 were used for water and 11 for gas injection.
In the first quarter of 2026, ACG drilled and completed two oil producer, three water injector and one gas injector wells.
During the quarter, ACG delivered an average of around 12 million cubic metres per day of ACG associated gas to the state of Azerbaijan (1 billion cubic metres in total), primarily at the Sangachal terminal but also to SOCAR’s Oil Rocks facility. The remainder of the associated gas produced was re-injected for reservoir pressure maintenance.
Following the signing of the ACG NAG Addendum in 2024, an initial production well was planned and safely drilled from ACG’s existing West Chirag platform. The well also represents a significant appraisal milestone, as the data obtained will help build future plans for ACG’s NAG development.
The well was successfully delivered in 2025, providing access to two priority NAG deep reservoirs - the shallower Qirmaki Upper Sand and the deeper Qirmaki Lower Sand reservoirs - both located beneath the currently producing oil reservoirs.
The well confirmed presence of gas resources in the shallower Qirmaki Upper Sand reservoir, which is the main target reservoir for first NAG production.
Additionally, the well encountered high pressure gas in the deeper Qirmaki Lower Sand reservoir from which first NAG production is planned to commence in the first half of the year as part of an initial period of well and reservoir testing, alongside production.
Production will then move via a well recompletion to the shallower Qirmaki Upper Sand reservoir – the main target reservoir for sustained production - in the second half of the year.
