TEHRAN – The head of Iran’s Petroleum Engineering and Development Company (PEDEC) has said that considering progress in Goreh-Jask oil pipeline project, National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) will be able to export its first oil cargo from Jask terminal by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20, 2021).

According to Touraj Dehqani, the development of the project is going on uninterrupted and the project has reached over 50 percent of physical progress, IRNA reported.

“With the main pumping stations of the project going operational, we will witness the beginning of the oil transfer from Goreh to Jask by the end of the year,” Dehqani said.

"Of course, like other parts of the project, Jask export terminal itself has developed and progressed,” he added.

The official noted that if the required storages at the Jask terminal were not ready by the end of the year, alternative options such as the use of single-point-mooring (SPM) storing the oil will be on the agenda.

The PEDEC’s goal is to export the first oil cargo from Jask oil terminal in the last month of the current Iranian calendar year (starts on February 19, 2021).

Goreh-Jusk oil pipeline project was inaugurated in late June by President Hassan Rouhani.

The pipeline will transfer one million barrels of heavy and light crude oils per day to Jask oil terminal in the southern Hormozgan Province to be exported.

Addressing the inaugural ceremony of the project, the Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said this project was one of the most strategic projects in the Rouhani administration.

Zanganeh said a total of $300 million has so far been invested in the project while another $800 million to $850 million is needed for its full operation.

“We hope that exports from Jask will begin as the government's most strategic project by the end of this [calendar] year (March 20, 2021),” the minister noted.

EF/MA