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"Big natural gas-producing country like Iran has lots of liquid hydrocarbons"

Business Materials 14 March 2012 12:49 (UTC +04:00)
A big natural gas-producing country like Iran has lots of liquid hydrocarbons, Research Director at Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Patrick Clawson told Trend.
"Big natural gas-producing country like Iran has lots of liquid hydrocarbons"

Azerbaijan, Baku, March 13 /Trend S.Isayev/

A big natural gas-producing country like Iran has lots of liquid hydrocarbons, Research Director at Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Patrick Clawson told Trend.

Clawson was commenting on the latest OPEC report on Iran's natural gas and oil production, which is different from the statistics that Iran provides itself.

A few days ago National Iranian Oil Company stated that country's average crude oil production hit 3.9 million barrels per day, and the figure is forecasted to reach 4 million barrels per day once underway development plans come on stream.

OPEC says Iran's average crude oil production is 3.42 mbpd, instead of 3.9 mbpd. Iran is OPEC's second largest oil producer and the fifth crude exporter in the world.

In February, according to OPEC, Iran's crude oil production decreased by 37,000 barrels per day compared to January. According to the report, Iran's oil production declined to 3.424 million barrels per day in February 2012. Iran's oil output in December 2011 was 3,533 and this figure decreased to 3,461 in January 2012.

Iran claimed that some 4.5 million of liquid hydrocarbons including condensates (400,000 bpd) and crude oil (3.9 mbpd) have been produced in the current Iranian calendar year.

"Since OPEC quotas are only on crude oil, it means the liquid hydrocarbons are not included there," Clawson said. "Any country like Algeria or Iran which produces a lot of natural gas will have a lot of liquid hydrocarbons, because such liquids are always present in natural gas".

Clawson added that the U.S. is in similar position, as a very large part of the U.S. liquid hydrocarbon production is not crude oil.

Regarding Iran, Clawson noted that compared to various countries' statistics, Iran's output is quite normal. He did not specify however, which other hydrocarbons the Islamic Republic produces, as there are about 200,000 liquid hydrocarbons remaining, according to Iranian National Oil Company.

Iran shares oil and gas fields with most of its neighbors including Iraq, Kuwait and Persian Gulf littoral countries such as Qatar and Oman. In recent years, Iran has been gradually moving towards becoming a major exporter of refined oil and petrochemical products with significant success.

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