Addressing a ceremony to sign a contract for the development of Belal offshore gas field between Pars Oil and Gas Company and Petropars on Saturday, he said: “I do not mean to battle cry, but the US cannot bring Iran’s oil exports to zero… The sanctions have not brought us to a halt; we are still alive.”

Petropars, Best Iranian E&P Company

Zangeneh said Petropars was the best exploration and production (E&P) company active in Iran’s oil industry which had displayed an acceptable performance in terms of timing and costs of developing projects.

On Saturday morning, Petropars signed the $440m deal with the Pars Oil and Gas Company (POGC) which is a subsidiary of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) in Tehran.

The buyback contract, which is to be enclosed to the integrated and master development plan of South Pars phases 11 to 24, is aimed at daily production of 500 million cubic feet (an equivalent of 14 million cubic meters per day) of rich gas in 34 months. The produced gas will be processed at the onshore refinery of South Pars Phase 12.  

Based on the deal, Pars Oil and Gas Company (POGC) will serve as the employer of the contract and will carry out reservoir studies and arrange sideline licensing rounds for the purposes of the project. Accordingly, the company is required to tap the capabilities of local manufacturers and contractors.

For its part, the contractor of the project, Petropars, is required to drill 8 wells in the offshore field, launch wellhead jackets and build and install a topside with 500 mcf/d of gas production capacity as well as a seabed pipeline with an estimated length of 20 kilometers.

Belal Gas Field is located east of South Pars in the Persian Gulf and 90 km southwest of Lavan Island.

He said the deal was a new form of oil contract in which the final contract value was not finalized and selection of the general contractor of the project would be put out to tender and the prices would be determined under NIOC supervision.

Farzad B Gas Field

Zangeneh said that developing Farzad B gas field as well as South Pars Phase 11 project would begin this calendar year which began on March 21.

He further touched on the Iran Plast Exhibition, saying that the fair would exhibit Iran’s latest developments in the petrochemical industry.

Zangeneh said Iran was now going through the second petrochemical leap in the country which will bring its output from currently 66 mt/y to over 100 mt/y and over 140 mt/y in the third leap of the industry.