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$60 billion worth of projects underway in Iran's South Pars gas field

Business Materials 27 February 2013 14:48 (UTC +04:00)

Azerbaijan, Baku, Feb.27/ Trend F.Milad

Iran is currently carrying out some 60 billion dollar worth of projects in the giant South Pars gas field, the Iranian oil minister said on Wednesday.

Some major projects are currently underway in the country's oil and gas sector, the ISNA News Agency quoted Rostam Qasemi as saying.

Domestic experts are mostly taking care of the projects, he said.

The development plan of five phases of Iran's giant South Pars gas field (phases 15-18 and phase 12) has entered its 67th month.

The mentioned phases were supposed to come on stream by the end of current Iranian year (March 20) but none of them is complete yet, the Mehr News agency reported.

Phases 15 and 16 and phase 12 are now 90 per cent and 88 per cent complete, respectively, while the physical progress of phases 17 and 18 has reached 76 percent.

Qasemi has warned to fine the contractors.

Iran is currently producing 300 mcm per day of gas from South Pars. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had said that the gas field's production capacity would be doubled by September.

It is while the managing director of Pars Oil and Gas Company, Mousa Souri, said last month that 5 of the gas field's phases will come on stream by the end of the next Iranian calendar year (March 19, 2014), boosting the total output of South Pars up to 180 million cubic meters per day.

According to Souri, Iran has invested over 7 billion dollars in the giant South Pars gas field in the first 9 months of current Iranian calendar year, which began March 20.

The oil ministry has used the money to equip different phases of South Pars, he said.

By the end of the current year (March 19, 2013) the amount would be raised up to 10 billion dollars, Souri added.

Iranian Oil Minster said in November that 775 million cubic meters (mcm) per day of gas could be extracted from South Pars after all its phases come on stream.

Iran has attached the priority on boosting gas production capacity from its joint oilfields with Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

The country, which sits on the world's second largest natural gas reserves after Russia, has been trying to enhance its gas production by increasing foreign and domestic investments, especially in its South Pars gas field.

South Pars is part of a wider gas field that is shared with Qatar. The larger field covers an area of 9,700 square kilometers, 3,700 square kilometers of which are in Iran's territorial waters (South Pars) in the Persian Gulf.

The remaining 6,000 square kilometers, referred to as the North Dome, are in Qatar's territorial waters.

The Iranian gas field contains 14 trillion cubic meters of natural gas, about eight percent of the world's reserves, and more than 18 billion barrels of LNG resources.

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