Azerbaijan, Baku, Dec.21 /Trend F.Milad/
Iran exported 8,121 gigawatt hours of electricity to its neighboring countries in the first nine months of current Iranian calendar year, which began March 20.
The figure shows 38.25 percent increase compared to the same period pervious year, the Fars News Agency reported.
Iran's electricity production also stood at 194,930 gigawatt hours during the mentioned period, showing 6.15 percent growth compared to the same period last year.
The managing director of Iran power generation transmission and distribution management company (TAVANIR), Homayoun Haeri, announced earlier this month that Iran plans to boost its electricity cooperation with the Persian Gulf region's countries, the IRNA News Agency reported.
Haeri had said in January that Iran will exchange up to 15 billion kilowatt hours of electricity with its neighboring countries by the end of the current calendar year (March 19, 2012), up 50 percent year on year.
Iran annually exports $5 million worth of electricity and technical and engineering services to its neighboring countries.
Iran seeks to become a major regional exporter of electricity and has attracted more than $1.1 billion in investments for the construction of ?three new power plants.
Iran's installed power generation capacity is currently about 67 gigawatts (GW).
The Energy Ministry plans to increase the electricity generation capacity by 5GW this calendar year, which ends on March 20, 2013.
Last year, Iran exported 8.6 billion kilowatt hours of electricity to its neighboring countries and the figure is projected to hit 10 billion kilowatt hours, he noted.
By the end of the Fifth Five-Year Economic Development Plan (March 2016), Iran will boost its electricity generation capacity by 25GW to reach 73 GW, Namjou said on February 7.