The recently commissioned USD 4 billion BTC (Baku-Thilisi-Ceyhan) pipeline heralds a new era of crude oil supply by linking the oilfields of the Caspian Sea, the world’s third largest reserve, with the Mediterranean coast of Turkey. Rotork Fluid System has supplied a total of 74 electro-hydraulic valve actuators for installation along the 1774km pipeline route through Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey. The scotch-yoke actuators, built at the Rotork Fluid system PCI factory in Melle, Germany, are equipped with customised control units providing special stroke times and safety functions for crude oil pipeline duties. Common functions such as local/remote control selection and open/close operation are provided as standard, whilst optional features such as automatic line break, high or low pressure closing and differential pressure systems are easily integrated. As recently announced, Rotork’s electric actuator division has also supplied several hundred IQ and IQT valve actuators on the BTC oil pipeline in an associated contract.
