Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 8
By Dalga Khatinoglu – Trend:
Iran will allocate $64 billion to increase gas processsing and storage capacity of the country to above 900 million cubic meters per day (mcm/d) by 2025, a source at oil ministry told Trend Sep.8.
Iran tested the refinery of phases 20 and 21 of the giant South Pars gas field Sep.5, while new refineries of the field are expected to become operational by September 20.
Currently seven refineries of South Pars (excluding the new tested refinery) are active with nominal capacity of 402 million cubic meters per day(mcm/d). Iran’s total nominal refining capacity also stands at 750 mcm/d, but the actual output is about 520 mcm/d.
Iran operates 13 gas refineries, but the number is expected to reach 19 by 2019 and 25 by 2025, the oil ministry’s official told Trend on condition of anonymity.
Last year, South Pars produced more than 356 mcm/d of commercial gas, while the country’s total commercial production stood at around 702 mcm/d.
The refinery of phases 20&21 is capable to sweeten 56 mcm/d of gas and would commence by October, when the phase 21 starts to produce 25 mcm/d. The phases 20 and 21 will together produce 50 mcm/d.
Currently the nominal production capacity of South Pars’s output stands at 430 mcm/d and the figure is expected to reach 530 mcm/d by March 2017.
South Pars is jointly owned by Iran and Qatar. On the Iranian side, its reserves stand at 14 trillion cubic meters of natural gas, sharing about a half of the country's total gas reserves.
Dalga Khatinoglu is the head of Trend Agency’s Iran news service, follow him on Twitter: @dalgakhatinoglu