TEHRAN - The operator of the South Pars Phase 14 development project said the project’s onshore refinery is scheduled to be fully operational by the first half of the next Iranian calendar year (September 2021).

“Based on the defined benchmarks, by the end of this [Iranian calendar] year (March 2021), utility units (including water, electricity, and steam), gas condensate storage unit, independent water intake unit, torches, etc. will be completed and commissioned, Mohammad Mehdi Tavassolipour told Shana.

According to Tavasolipour, Phase 14 refinery project has currently progressed more than 84 percent, while the project’s total EPC (engineering, procurement, and construction) has progressed over 88.86 percent.

He noted that some problems caused by the U.S. sanctions and limited financial resources were the main challenges that slowed down the completion of the project.

Phase 14 refinery will be the last onshore processing facility belonging to the massive joint gas field that Iran shares with Qatar in the Persian Gulf waters.

The official further said that the offshore section of the phase was fully operational with 56 million cubic meters per day (mcm/d) of production capacity. The last platform of the project came online on March 19 with a production capacity of 14.2 mcm/d.

The offshore section of the phase entails four platforms including two satellites and two main platforms each with 14.2 mcm/d of production capacity.

Phase 14 development is aimed at producing 56.6 million cubic meters per day of rich gas, 75,000 barrels/day of gas condensate and 400 tons/day of sulfur, and 1 million tons/year of liquefied petroleum gas and one million tons/year of ethane to be fed to petrochemical plants.

South Pars gas field is divided into 24 standard phases of development in the first stage. Most of the phases are fully operational at the moment.

The huge offshore field covers an area of 9,700 square kilometers, 3,700 square kilometers of which are in Iran’s territorial waters in the Persian Gulf. The remaining 6,000 square kilometers, called North Dome, are situated in Qatar’s territorial waters.

The field is estimated to contain a significant amount of natural gas, accounting for about eight percent of the world’s reserves, and approximately 18 billion barrels of condensate.

EF/MA