TEHRAN - Iran’s Oil Minister Javad Oji has said five major petrochemical projects will become operational by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 19, 2024), Shana reported.

Speaking in a cabinet session on Wednesday, the minister said: “In addition to the five projects, the implementation of several semi-finished projects suspended since 2004 and 2006 has also been resumed.”

The project of Hamedan Ibn Sina Petrochemical Company, which was approved during a visit of Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei to the western province in 2004, had been left undecided, explained Oji, saying the project is now in progress as the government allocated $1.0 billion to complete it.

Despite the public investment made by 98,000 people, Zanjan Petrochemical Company had also been among the pending projects since 2006, the top official recalled and added the project operations restarted and its progress has reached 53 percent from 18 percent.

Golestan, Torbat Heidarieh, and Boroujen petrochemical projects are also among the underway projects, according to the minister.

Oji said the mentioned projects will help prevent the sale of raw materials, generate revenues in foreign currency, and create job opportunities.

The head of Iran’s National Petrochemical Company (NPC) said on Tuesday the country’s industry welcomes foreign investment but does not wait for foreign companies’ participation to pursue its development projects, NIPNA reported.

Delivering a speech during a ceremony to celebrate the 50th establishment anniversary of Bandar Imam Petrochemical Complex in Mahshahr, a city in the southwestern province of Khuzestan, Morteza Shahmirzaei said a comprehensive roadmap for completing the petrochemical industry’s value chain according to the existing upstream feeds will be finalized and presented within the next month so that with its implementation, Iran's petrochemical industry will reach its real position in the world.

The official has previously said that completing the value chain is not a motto, while it is a top agenda of the NPC’s activities, it is a program and a duty.

Referring to the rapid development of the petrochemical industry from basic products to the end of the value chain in the 13th government, Morteza Shah-Mirzaei reiterated: "Completing the value chain of the petrochemical industry is not a slogan; As an inviolable strategy, it is a task, plan and duty that my colleagues are following up with all their efforts.”

The official further put the country’s petrochemical production capacity at over 92 million tons, and said: “Today we are almost self-sufficient in the main petrochemical sectors including products and equipment.”

Iran's petrochemical industry accounts for 28 percent of the region's petrochemical capacity and 2.7 percent of the world's petrochemical capacity, the NPC head announced.

Stating that Iran's petrochemical industry exported more than 16 billion dollars of petrochemical products to the world markets last year, he added that the products supplied to the world markets are in excess of the domestic demand, because the priority of the petrochemical industry is to meet the domestic needs in order to complete the value chain.

He pointed to the development of energy diplomacy in the 13th government and said the activity program in offshore petrochemical industries is being followed seriously and good successes have been achieved in this regard. With the expansion of relations with neighboring and aligned countries, other countries have demanded the supply of catalysts, equipment and machinery from Iran.

It should be announced that before the above-mentioned press conference, seven cooperation documents worth $58 million were signed between the Petrochemical Special Economic Zone Organization and domestic companies in order to deal with the sanctions and develop the knowledge-based economy and complete the petrochemical value chain.

The petrochemical industry plays a crucial role in Iran’s non-oil economy, as petrochemical export is the second-largest source of revenue for the country after crude oil. Petrochemical exports already constitute nearly 33 percent of the country’s non-oil exports.

According to Shahmirzaei, the company plans to increase its annual petrochemical production capacity to 200 million tons over the next 10 years.

In this regard, Iranian Oil Minister Javad Oji said that more than 100 petrochemical projects with a total investment of about $70 billion have been defined and will be implemented across the country.

Oji noted that the country will also be completely self-sufficient in producing the catalysts used in the petrochemical industry by the end of the current government administration's incumbency (August 2025).

EF/MA

Photo: Oil Minister Javad Oji