Tehran, Iran, Oct. 27
By Mehdi Sepahvand -- Trend:
Iran says it has stopped importing gasoline from northern borders because the gasoline thereby imported lacks required standards.
"There was gasoline cargo in the first half of this year (Iranian fiscal year starts on March 21) which had surpassed red lines and we did not allow it to be imported. We told the Oil Ministry to stop importing gasoline from the north and the Oil Ministry obeyed," said Nayereh Pirouzbakht, CEO of the National Iranian Standards Organization, ISNA news agency reported Oct. 27.
In the first six months of the current Iranian year, 66 gasoline cargos were brought to Iran, three of which were returned because they were substandard, she stated.
In regard to the quality of gasoline distributed in the country, the official said samplings across eight megacities have not returned any positive result.
Pirouzbakht said next year sampling operations will be carried out in 17 cities.
She also said that the Shazand refinery has resumed operation after repairs which took 45 days.
Shazand refinery was shut down for a second time on Sept. 17 for technical problems.
The refinery's RFCC unit went offline several times due to technical problems last year. During the downtime, the refinery's Euro 4 gasoline production was decreased by 8-9 million liters per day and was nearly halved.
Shazand is Iran's largest gasoline production unit, meeting euro-4 standards. It supplies gasoline to a number of big cities, like Tehran.
Daily gasoline consumption in Iran hit 75.77 million liters in the week ended on Sept. 4.
The country's gasoline output is currently around 64 million liters, so it needs to import the rest. The Islamic Republic only imports Euro-4 gasoline currently.
Edited by CN