Azerbaijan, Baku, Oct.12/ Trend G. Mehdi/
An advisor to the Energy Ministry of Iran has expressed the hope that power plants nationwide would not face a shortage of fuel during the winter months as natural gas consumption is rising in households.
"Due to the increase in natural gas consumption in households during the winter, power plants may face a shortage of gas, but it is hoped that there would be no problem as maintenance and overhaul operations are well underway," Hamid Chitchian said, the ISNA News Agency reported on Friday.
Sufficient fuel is stored at power plants, he said, adding that the fuel storage capacity has been increased.
On October 8, an official with Iran Power Generation Transmission and Distribution Management Company (TAVANIR) stated the capacity of fuel storage facilities at Iranian power plants has been doubled since the calendar year 1386 (March 2007-March 2008).
Capacity is currently around 5.68 billion litres, including 2.64 billion litres of heating oil and 3.04 billion litres of diesel oil, Abdorrasoul Pishahangi told the ISNA News Agency.
On September 4, an official with the National Iranian Oil Production and Distribution Company said that the private sector has attained self-sufficiency in all the designing, engineering and building processes related to oil storage facilities.
Mehr News Agency quoted Heydar Shamsi as saying that five fuel storage facilities will be inaugurated by March 2013 in Iran, boosting the national fuel storage capacity to 12.8 billion litres.
He added that four new storage facilities will be commissioned by the end of the current Iranian year (March 20, 2013).
At present, Iran has the capacity to store 11.5 billion litres of fuel which is sufficient for 58 days consumption. Last year, 16 storage facilities were inaugurated nationwide, boosting the country's storage capacity by one billion litres. The storage capacity is planned to hit 14.5 billion litres by 2016.