Azerbaijan, Baku, Dec.18/ Trend F.Milad/
Iran's Sarajeh gas storage facility came on stream on Monday, Massoud Samivand, managing director of Natural Gas Storage Company said on Tuesday, the IRNA News Agency reported.
The Sarajeh gas storage facility is Iran's first gas storage facility which is second to none in the Middle East. It is located at the Sarajeh reservoir at Qom, south of Tehran.
The facility is said to have capacity to store 1.2 billion cubic meters of gas in its first phase and 3.3 billion cubic meters in the second phase.
The Sarajeh gas storage facility's injection capacity is 10 million cubic meters per day.
Samivand went on to note that once the Shoorijeh gas storage facility comes on stream some 4.8 billion cubic meters would be added to the country's total gas storage capacity.
"The project is currently 65 per cent complete. The first phase of the project with 2.4 billion cubic meters capacity, will come on stream in the spring," he said.
Iran will establish 40 gas storage facilities in the coming years, IRNA quoted National Iranian Gas Company's managing director Javad Owji as saying on November 19.
On October 1 Massoud Samivand told the Mehr News Agency that Iran will be able to store 110 mcm of gas per day when it completes several relevant projects.
Upon completion of five to six projects, Iran's gas storage capacity will grow to 110 mcm making it possible for the country to have a greater share in global gas sales.
Massoud Samivand had previously said on April 27 that two natural gas storage facilities will become operational in the current Iranian calendar year which ends March 19, 2013, to store natural gas equal to six phases of the South Pars gas field.
The official added that depleted hydrocarbon or ground water reservoirs as well as salt domes are priorities for building underground gas storage facilities.
He stated that the country's natural gas storage capacity should reach 14 billion cubic meters by the end of the Fifth Economic Development Plan (2015.)
Samivand announced that the construction of two other underground gas storage facilities is simultaneously going on in the Yortsha region near the city of Varamin, and the Shourijeh region in Khorasan Province.
He said the three gas storage facilities will be able to contain eight billion cubic meters of natural gas per year.
More than $200 billion is said to be needed to invest in the implementation of Iran's gas projects.