TEHRAN – Pars Oil and Gas Company (POGC) has finished the annual overhaul operations for 10 of the South Pars gas field’s platforms in 45 days, the company’s production and operations director announced.

As published on the POGC website, Alireza Ebadi said the annual overhaul program of the field’s platforms was started on May 4 and so far 10 platforms have gone through the operations despite the restrictions imposed by the outbreak of coronavirus.

“Due to precautionary measures taken by the company against Coronavirus, there has been no interruption in South Pars executive operations,” Ebadi said.

According to the official, 24 platforms of the giant gas field (which Iran shares with Qatar in the Persian Gulf) are planned to go through the overhaul operations by the end of the seventh Iranian calendar month of Mehr (October 21).

He explained that the overhaul of South Pars gas platforms is carried out in the first half of the year due to the reduction in natural gas demand across the country, adding: "These repairs are aimed at monitoring, troubleshooting and preparing platforms for safe and stable gas production in the second half of the year."

Pars Oil and Gas Company has taken preventive health measures to deal with the outbreak of coronavirus among its employees working on the platforms, and fortunately, there has been no case of this disease so far, the official stated.

Back in May, director of Technical Inspection at South Pars Gas Complex had said that reducing the time of the complexes’ annual overhaul operations has saved the country 2.35 trillion rials (over $55 million).

“One of the major achievements of the complex in the past few years has been the reduction of overhaul period which has resulted in more production and also more revenue,” Alireza Barzegar said.

South Pars Gas field is currently divided into 24 standard phases in the Iranian side and 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.

The mentioned gas field covers an area of 9,700 square kilometers, 3,700 square kilometers of which, called South Pars, are in Iran’s territorial waters. The remaining 6,000 square kilometers, called North Dome, are situated in Qatar’s territorial waters.

All the offshore operations of the development project of the field, except for phase 11, were completed in the past Iranian calendar year (ended on March 19).

EF/MA