Investors seem to have developed cold feet over the ambitious Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) natural gas pipeline project. Reasons for investors’ apathy towards the project are political, commercial and also geographical. The investors will have to build the 1735 km pipeline through what is arguably the most dangerous terrain in the world and this fact is acting as the main deterrent for the project. However, providing a carrot to the investors by way of a stake in the prospective Galkynysh field with estimates reserves of a massive 16 TCM may help to change the investors’ mindset. However, at present with no investor showing any interest in the project, TAPI has failed make much headway.
TAPI pipeline which is also known as ‘peace pipeline’ is expected to be completed by 2017 and will transport 33 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year to Afghanistan, Pakistan and India from Turkmenistan for over 3o years. The project is estimated to cost $7.6 billion.
