chapter I. Contract of the Century

Oil and gas pipelines are the modern-day arteries of our world, transporting precious hydrocarbons, the blood of our civilization. Even in the current economic crisis, as the world’s economy still expands, demand for energy grows, and the needy fingers of oil companies reach further and deeper into the earth.
Stretching over 1,700 kilometers while skirting five conflict zones in the shadow of the Caucasus, Europe's highest mountain range, the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline is a delicate web of social, cultural and political concerns. Over four billion dollars in building costs make it one of the world's largest private construction projects, and currently seventy million dollars worth of oil is being pumped daily to the West. Combating Russian and Iranian energy influence, this pipeline project is nicknamed as “the New Great Game”, a game that affects the lives of millions of citizens in the three neighboring countries of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey. From Baku to Ceyhan, black gold flows under the feet of war refugees and impoverished populations, while governments continue to make promises that everyone will get their share of oil money.
View over polluted oil lakes in Balakhani oil village. Baku. Azerbaijan, 2003 In September 1994 the so-called “Contract of the Century” for the exploration of the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli oil fields in the Caspian Sea was signed between the Azerbaijan State Oil Company and a conglomerate of western oil companies, lead by BP. This agreement marked the starting point of a second oil boom in Azerbaijan, the first dating back to the end of the nineteen century when investors like the Nobel brothers, the Rothschild's, and Rockefellers arrived to exploit the onshore hydrocarbon fields surrounding Baku, Azerbaijan’s capital. Oil investment has brought new wealth to a country of rampant corruption, poverty, unemployment and postwar humanitarian disaster, but the gap between rich and poor has only widened and job opportunities still barely exist outside urban areas. While billions are poured into profitable offshore fields in the Caspian Sea, the unattended turn of the century and Soviet oil infrastructure has collapsed, turning the environment into a noxious wasteland of oil lakes and dump-yards. Prior to “Contract of the Century”, Baku, in the war-torn nineties, was a ghost city where a military curfew prohibited residents from being on the streets past midnight. Today, the city - where café life used to be limited to men drinking tea - is vibrant with nightlife. With the influx of foreign money and culture, western bars and restaurants have sprung up to serve the thin layer of society who have benefited from the oil boom. Prostitution is on the rise as well, as young women stream to Baku from the countryside to attempt to fill their pockets with oil money. While drunk and jolly strangers roam the streets and high heels stomp disco floors as the Baku night beams spotlights into the sky, in Azerbaijani villages, people live without gas and water, with only a few hours of electricity per day.
Worker at a drilling wire factory in Bibi-Heybat oil village. Baku, Azerbaijan. 2005
Soviet ship wrecks in Bibi-Heybat oil village. Baku, Azerbaijan. 2006

Rena Effendi

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chapter I. Contract of the Century