Major Oil and Gas Projects

Abstract

The first period of development of the Caspian region oil industry by foreign companies took place in the early years of the twentieth century, when Azerbaijan was the world’s largest oil producer (McKay, 1984). Around 320 companies were involved in the Russian oil industry before World War I.²⁵ That war, however, shook the relatively well-developed Russian oil industry to its foundations. By the end of the tsarist era, Baku had become a point of international conflict, with the oil industry at its epicentre.