Baku, Azerbaijan, Dec.7
By Emil Ilgar – Trend:
BP will pay off its debts to Iran on Rhum gas field in the coming weeks, Deputy Minister of Petroleum for International Affairs and Trading Amir-Hossein Zamaninia told Mehr Dec.7.
He said that Iran is still unable to access its revenues from the development of the Rhum gas field due to banking problems.
Iran developed the Rhum gas field jointly with the UK. Ownership of Rhum is shared equally between BP and the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC).
The UK deposits Iran’s revenues from Rhum gas field to a bank account of NIOC, but Iran is unable to access its funds.
Without mentioning a concrete figure, Zamaninia said that BP’s debts to Iran is several hundred million dollars.
The project itself, commenced in 2005, is worth some $656 million.
Gas production from the Rhum field was stopped in 2010 due to international sanctions against Iran, however UK announced in 2014 that it resumed gas production from the field and Iran’s revenues are being deposited to a frozen bank account.
It isn't clear how much is the field's current output, but at its peak, the output capacity is about 8.5 million cubic meters per day. According to the estimates provided by BP, the Rhum field contains 22.6 billion cubic meters of gas.
Iran and P5+1 Group including US, UK, France, China, Russia + Germany reached a nuclear agreement with Iran, which was implemented in January 2016. The agreement eliminated sanctions on Iran.