Tehran (IRNA)--Iran will be turned into the biggest oil refiner in the Persian Gulf by 2012, said director of the Refinery and Oil Products Distribution Company’s refinery affairs.

Aminollah Eskandari added in a press conference on Tuesday that currently Iran ranks first in making investment in refinery and ranks second in refinery after Saudi Arabia.
Saudi’s current refining capacity stands at 2,100,000 barrels a day while the figure for Iran will reach 3,300,000 barrels a day by 2012, he said, noting that this is while the former’s capacity is to hit three million barrels a day by 2015.
Stating that Saudi Arabia is considered Iran’s rival in the field of refining in the Persian Gulf, he further said that the country has undertaken the implementation of great refinery projects.
“Given the economic growth of big consumers such as India and China, oil producing countries have made huge investments in oil refining,” Eskandari said.
Pointing out that most of the Iranian refinery projects will become operational in 2012, he also said that oil products produced in Hormuz refinery, which has a capacity of 300,000 barrels a day, will be completely exported.
“Some section of Bandar Abbas Gas condensate refinery’s products and Khuzestan refinery will also be exported,” he noted.
Referring to an increase in the refining capacity of Bandar Abbas refinery from 232,000 barrels a day to 320,000 this year, Eskandari also said that crude refining capacity of Iran’s nine refineries currently stands at 1,750,000 barrels a day.
Abadan refinery is the biggest in the country with the capacity of 425,000 barrels a day while Kermanshah refinery is the smallest with the capacity of 22,000 to 23,000 barrels a day, he noted.
The official also said that a total of eight million liters of liquefied gas, 43 million liters of gasoline, 21 million liters of kerosene, 82 million liters of gas oil, 75 million liters of fuel oil are produced in the country’s nine refineries everyday.
Stating that Iran’s refining capacity will be doubled once seven new refineries are set up, he said that studies on the projects have been complete and their physical progress stands between 4-20 percent.
Establishment of seven new refineries requires 15.5 billion euros, he said.