Azerbaijan is on pace to meet its natural gas export target this year. But Baku still has a long way to go before the country can meet its ambitious export commitments for 2027. Touting Azerbaijan as a “reliable supplier,” President Ilham Aliyev announced at a political conference in the UK in July that the country’s annual export volume for this year was projected to increase by over 10 percent of 2022’s total, reaching almost 13 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas. Provided Azerbaijan hits that number, it will mark the first…