Natural gas condensates output is expected to double by the end of the calendar year next March, the state news agency reported.
An estimated 650,000 barrels of gas condensates are produced in Iran per day and is projected to reach 1.3 million barrels, IRNA reported based on information from the Oil Ministry.
Gas condensate is a low-density mixture of hydrocarbon liquids that are present as gaseous components in raw natural gas produced from gas fields.
The higher production, mostly NGLs and naphtha, will come from the newly inaugurated Parsian Sepehr Gas Refinery in Fars Province, the Persian Gulf Bidboland refinery in Khuzestan Province and Kangan Petro Refining Company in Bushehr Province.
Ongoing projects, namely Dehloran Gas Refinery in Ilam Province, Kharg NGL Plant on Kharg Island off the Persian Gulf and the NGL 3200 project in Khuzestan will also add to the output.
Costing $1.1 billion, the Parsian Sepehr refinery’s natural gas liquid recovery plant opened last month with annual capacity of 3.2 million tons of gas condensates and NGL.
The Kangan NGL facility, which became operational in March, has an annual capacity of 3.5 million tons. It receives 21 million tons of natural gas (feedstock) per year from Phase 12 of the South Pars Gas Field (Iran's mega gas field in the Persian Gulf) for producing 2 million tons of ethane, 1 million tons of propane, 500,000 tons of butane and 250,000 tons of pentane annually.
Based in the southwest, the Persian Gulf Bidboland gas refinery went on stream in January with a daily capacity of 56 million cubic meters of associated gas from East and West Karoun oil fields that include several large oilfields straddling the Iran-Iraq border namely Azadegan, Yaran, Yadavaran and Darkhoein.
Bid Boland has an annual capacity of 10.4 million tons of methane, which is injected into the national gas grid, plus 1.5 million tons ethane, 1 million tons propane, 600,000 tons gas condensates and 500,000 tons butane fed into petrochemical plants in Mahshahr and Gachsaran.
A major part of the gas condensates output (500,000 barrels) is piped to the Persian Gulf Star Refinery in Hormozgan Province and is converted into gasoline.
Gas condensate is also sold to petrochemical plants in Asalouyeh and Mahshahr in the south as feedstock to produce value-added products and also is offered on the Iran Energy Exchange.
