TEHRAN- Following a program called “A-B-Iran”, the Iranian Energy Ministry is going to inaugurate 250 major water and electricity projects worth 500 trillion rials (about $11.9 billion) during the current Iranian calendar year (ends on March 20, 2021), IRIB quoted Energy Minister Reza Ardakanian as saying on Monday.

According to Ardakanian, in the water sector, the mentioned projects include nine major dams, implementation of modern irrigation systems in 54,000 hectares of land, 20 water, and wastewater treatment plants and supplying drinkable water through pipelineس to more than 1400 rural areas across the country.

As for the power projects, the inauguration of 12 thermal power plants with a total capacity of 2,100 megawatts (MW) as well as hundreds of solar and wind farms and other small scale power stations are on the agenda.

The official further pointed to the electricity exchange with neighboring countries and the establishment of joint committees and consortiums with Russia, Afghanistan, Armenia, Tajikistan and Qatar as other programs of the ministry for this year.

Mentioning the A-B-Iran scheme [the acronyms A and B stand for water, electricity in Persian], under which the ministry inaugurates some water, electricity projects across the country every week, Ardakanian noted that the program has been already commenced and four projects are scheduled to be inaugurated this week in Tehran.

In early March, Ardakanian had announced that 5,931 energy projects worth 8.84 quadrillion rials (about $210.4 billion) are underway across the country.

Speaking on the occasion of finishing the A-B-Iran program on March 11, the official said during this program 227 major projects with a total investment of 335.6 trillion rials (about $7.99 billion) went operational across the country.

According to the minister, during the 20 weeks of the mentioned program in the previous year, the minister made 31 trips to various provinces for inaugurating energy projects.

The official also announced that three power plants and 40 new projects worth 60 trillion rials (about $1.4 billion) will be inaugurated during the first quarter of the current calendar year.

EF/MA