Azerbaijan, Baku, Feb. 22/ Trend F.Milad/
Iran will start drilling operation at the South Pars gas field's oil layer, so that oil extraction will begin by the end of the next calendar year (March 2013), the managing director of the Pars Oil and Gas Company Mousa Souri stated.
Mousa Souri told Shana news agency that the gas field's daily production hit the record high of 290 million cubic meters in the current year. Once all the 18 phases of the gas field come on stream, the country's gross domestic production will increase by 18 percent, he added.
The South Pars oil layer was discovered in 1988. Ten years later the first exploratory well was drilled. But the work halted for six years and finally the project was transferred to PetroIran Company in 2005.
The National Iranian Oil Company's managing director Ahmad Qalebani said that the country's daily oil and gas outputs should amount to 5 million barrels and 1.47 billion cubic meters by 2015.
Iran ranks second on the world's largest natural gas reserves after Russia. It is trying to increase its gas production by increasing foreign and domestic investments, especially in its South Pars gas field.
The South Pars gas field is shared by Iran and Qatar. The Iranian share, which is divided into 29 phases, has about 14 trillion cubic meters of gas, or about 8 percent of the total world reserves, and more than 18 billion barrels of liquefied natural gas resources.