Azerbaijan\'s Shakh-Deniz gas field may hold up to two times more natural gas than current estimates of 1 trillion cubic metres, an Azeri oil official said on Friday. Khoshbakht Yusifzade, vice president of Azeri state oil firm SOCAR, which is part of the project, said the fourth evaluation drilling was under way in the south-western part of the field. \"We believe that this drilling may boost estimates of Shakh-Deniz\'s reserves by one and a half to two times,\" Yusifzade told a news conference, referring to the field\'s recoverable reserves. The first production of gas from the field, operated by Norway\'s Statoil and Britain\'s BP Plc , is expected in August this year and Shakh-Deniz may produce 0.85 billion cubic metres (bcm) by the end of 2005, Yusifzade said. In 2007 Shakh-Deniz is expected to produce 5.4 bcm of gas, and output is set to rise to 8.1 bcm in 2008 and 8.4 bcm in 2009, the peak year of the first stage of the project. Gas from the field may be exported to Europe via a $1 billion pipeline to Turkey and possibly to Greece. Shakh-Deniz\'s other shareholders are Russia\'s LUKOIL , France\'s Total and Iranian and Turkish state oil firms. The second stage will come on stream in 2011 at the earliest, BP said last year. It will largely depend on Turkey\'s needs for additional gas as well as on the group\'s ability to ship more gas onwards to Europe. (Reuters)