TEHRAN - Head of the National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC) Majid Chegeni said the cumulative gas supply to the country’s power plants in the first three months of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21-June 21) has hit a new record high of 21.814 billion cubic meters.

According to Chegeni, the figure increased by about 3.3 billion cubic meters compared to the same period in the previous year, IRNA reported.

Underlining the NIGC’s important role in maintaining the stable supply of electricity in the country by providing gas to the power plants in collaboration with the Energy Ministry and the Iranian Electricity Network Management Company, the official said: “In the past years, the officials did not pay enough attention to the necessity of investing in gas development projects like storage and refining, which has caused the NIGC to deal with the challenge of imbalance in recent years.”

Gas supply to power plants reaches its maximum level during the summer peak consumption period (the Q2 of the year) in Iran.

Currently, all the country’s gas and thermal power plants are connected to the national gas network, however, in the cold seasons, with the increase in gas consumption by the domestic sector the supply to the power plants will be reduced and replaced with liquefied fuel.

Iran is currently producing over 1000 mcm of natural gas daily which is mostly used inside the country for the domestic sector and also as fuel for the power plants and a small portion is also exported to the neighboring countries like Iraq.

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