TEHRAN – President Hassan Rouhani officially inaugurated 10 major oil, gas, and petrochemical projects worth $20 billion in the southern energy-rich Assalouyeh region on Sunday.

Five phases of the South Pars gas field, four petrochemical projects, as well as the South Pars’ oil layer came on stream, Shana reported.

South Pars is part of a huge offshore field, shared with Qatar in the Persian Gulf. The field is estimated to hold about 8 percent of the world’s natural gas reserves.

South Pars is divided into 24 standard phases, each is projected to produce 25 million cubic meters (mcm) of gas per day. 

The five newly inaugurated phases, namely 17-21, will add 150 mcm to the country’s current daily gas output of about 570 mcm/d to push Iran’s gas extraction from the joint field up to equate that of Qatar.

These phases will also add to Iran’s production and export of gas condensate, LPG, and ethane.

The South Pars’ oil layer was discovered in 1992. It is estimated to hold between 1.5-4 billion barrels of oil. It is planned to reach an output capacity of 35,000 bpd in the first phase.

The International Energy Agency has predicted that Iran will expand its oil production capacity by 400,000 bpd to reach 4.15 million bpd in 2022.

Moreover, the four petrochemical projects will raise the country’s annual output and revenues by 2 million tons and $2 billion respectively.

Petrochemical output is expected to exceed 59 million tons in the current Iranian calendar year (started on March 21). The country plans to export 23 million tons of petrochemical products, worth $11 billion, in the current year.

EF/MG