Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. Mar. 11
By Rahim Zamanov - Trend:
Iranian Fars News Agency reported on Mar.11 that the country discovered four new oil and gas fields.
The discovered fields are located in the western, southern and central parts of the country.
It is still not clear whether the fields are jointly owned with any other neighbouring country, but it is estimated that the southern and western fields are joint fields.
The oil reserves of the newly discovered fields are estimated at two billion barrels and that the oil is of the highest quality.
Fars News Agency claimed that the new discoveries have increased Iran's oil reserves to 160 billion barrels.
National Iranian Oil Company's Director for Exploration Affairs, Hormoz Felavand, said on Mar. 5 that Iran plans to increase its production up to five million barrels of oil per day and 1.4 billion cubic meters of natural gas per day, Iranian Mehr News Agency reported.
"If the country reaches and keeps these amounts,and in case of no new discovery, Iran's oil and gas reserves would last for 70 years," he explained.
"The oil reserves of most countries except for Iran and Saudi Arabia would be finished by that time," Felavand added.
The country holds the world's third largest proven oil and largest natural gas reserves.
The country's total in-place oil reserves have been estimated at more than 560 billion barrels, with 140 billion barrels of extractable oil. Moreover, heavy and extra heavy varieties of crude oil account for roughly 70-100 billion barrels of the total reserves.
Iran's gas reserves have been estimated at 33.6 trillion cubic meters.
Edited by S.M.