Azerbaijan, Baku, Feb. 4 / Trend F.Milad/
Iran has imported four drilling rigs and plans to buy or rent four more rigs within a bid to accelerate explorations in oil and gas fields, Iranian Central Oilfields Company's managing director said.
Mehdi Fakour told Mehr news agency that new drilling rigs will be purchased without holding tenders.
Iran plans to commission seven new drilling rigs in the South Pars gas field by September next year, Mehr news agency reported.
At present, 11 drilling rigs are in operation in 13 phases of the gas field. Developing all the phases will boost Iran's gas output by 700 million cubic meters per day, the report says.
The South Pars gas field is shared by Iran and Qatar. The Iranian share, which is divided into 29 phases, is about 14 trillion cubic meters of gas, or about eight percent of the total world reserves, and more than 18 billion barrels of liquefied natural gas resources.
Iran plans to increase the number of its drilling rigs operating in its onshore and offshore oilfields by 36 units to hit 134 units by March 2014, Ahmad Qalebani, the National Iranian Oil Company's managing director, said.