Baku, Azerbaijan, Aug 2
By Dalga Khatinoglu – Trend:
British Royal Dutch Shell has submitted the results of its survey of Iran’s Yadavaran and Azadegan oil fields, as well as Kish gas field, based on a memorandum of understanding (MoU), signed in 2016, Iran’s Oil Ministry announced on Aug 2 on its official website.
The top officials of Shell met with the Deputy Oil Minister Gholamreza Manouchehri on Wednesday to discuss their involvement in the projects.
Iran is preparing to issues tenders on the mentioned three fields in a near future.
The Head of Media Relations at MENA Shell Nureddin Wefati told Trend on July 25 that, the company, aligned with its long-term strategy, is exploring potential business opportunities in Iran.
He refused to confirm the mentioned negotiations, stating "no comment on any specific deal."
Negotiations between Iran and European giants came a week after US Congress passed a bill on new sanctions against Iran, expected to be signed in by President Donald Trump this week.
Yadavaran
Iran has signed a buy-back contract with China’s Sinopec to develop the first phase of Yadavaran field, which contains 34 billion barrels of in-situ (“in place”) oil reserves. The project has been divided into three phases.
With completion of the first phase, the output would reach 85,000 b/d, and in second and third phases the output would reach 180,000 b/d and 300,000 b/d, respectively.
According to the mentioned official document, the first phase of Yadavaran field was developed by 99.15 percent as of July 1, 2017. The production level also increased by about 67,000 b/d to 107,800 b/d, compared to the beginning of year. The first phase of the field is semi-operational since 2012.
North Azadegan
Iran has a buy-back contract with China’s CNPCI to develop the North Azadegan field. The first phase of the project was developed by 95.01 percent as of July 1, 2017, with actual output of 75,329 b/d.
North Azadegan contains 5.6 billion barrels of in-situ oil reserves. In the second phase of this project, the output level would double to peak at 150,000 b/d.
South Azadegan
Iran also had an agreement with CNPCI to develop South Azadegan, but the country cancelled the deal with the Chinese company in 2014 because of long delays in the development process.
The project’s first phase was developed by 37.99 percent as of July 1 1, 2017. The first phase was aimed to produce 320,000 b/d of oil. The second phase would add 280,000 b/d to this volume.
The field contains 25.34 billion barrels of in-situ oil and its recovery rate is as low as 6.6 percent. Currently, five foreign companies, including France’s Total and Japan’s Inpex, are studying the Azadegan field and the ways of increasing the recovery rate, based on confidentiality agreements.
Kish gas field
The Kish gas field is expected to yield 28 million cubic meters per day of natural gas, to be used domestically, and 11,300 bpd of gas condensate set for export.