Tehran, Iran, Sept. 26
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Hamid Reza Araqi, the managing director of the National Iranian Gas Company, said an Iranian private company has won a contract to bring gas flaring at the country’s South Pars field to zero.
An anti-flaring project was put out to tender recently and an Iranian private firm won it, Araqi told IRNA on Sept. 26.
The firm is tasked with collecting flare gas at South Pars and sweetening it, as the bulk of Iran’s gas flaring occurs at southern oil fields and the air of areas where this takes place is often polluted, he added.
A 2015 World Bank report said Iran flared some 10.5 billion cubic meters of gas a year, putting it behind Russia and Iraq as the third largest flaring country in the world. Its satellite data in 2017 showed an increase in flaring of more than 4 billion cubic meters compared to the previous year.
Oil producing countries often burn or flare a certain amount of natural gas that accompanies crude oil to the surface, which is too small to be recovered or pipelined to a processing facility. The process, however, emits hazardous air pollutants.