The National Iranian Drilling Company, a subsidiary of National Iranian Oil Company, has drilled 17 oil and gas wells in the West Karoun oil block since the beginning of the current Iranian year (March 21), the head of NIDC’s Planning Office said.
“Of the total wells, four were development wells and the rest were appraisal and exploratory,” ISNA also quoted Babak Zanganeh as saying.
The wells were drilled in oilfields managed by the National Iranian South Oil Company, the Iranian Offshore Oil Company and the Petroleum Engineering and Development Company in West Karoun that includes several large oilfields straddling the Iran-Iraq border, namely Azadegan, Yaran, Yadavaran and Darkhoein, with the first three divided into north and south projects.
The block holds an estimated 67 billion barrels of oil in place.
Oil extraction from the shared West Karoun block in southern Khuzestan Province has reached 420 barrels per day, showing a sixfold increase compared to 2013.
“NIDC has drilled 4,866 onshore and offshore oil and gas wells over the past four decades, of which 4,310 are onshore and 414 are in the deep waters,” Zanganeh said.
The company has a key role in drilling exploratory and development wells in Azadegan Oilfield in Khuzestan Province near the Iraqi border and in South Pars, the world's largest gas field Iran shares with Qatar in the Persian Gulf.
Handling nearly 70% of onshore drilling, NIDC has 75 drilling rigs – 68 of which are used in joint oilfields, namely Azar and South Pars. It is the main offshore and onshore contractor and provides 90% of drilling services to domestic companies.
Indigenizing the know-how for the manufacturing of parts and equipment used in different industrial sectors is one of the major strategies followed by Iran to achieve self-reliance.
NIDC draws on the capacity and potential of domestic firms in indigenizing parts and equipment for the key oil and gas sector.
The firm has managed to indigenize the know-how for manufacturing over 6,000 drilling equipment in collaboration with domestic manufacturers and engineers in the past two years.
Indigenized equipment includes blowout preventers, traction motors, draw-works, drilling fluid recycling systems, mission centrifugal pumps, top drives and drilling rig pressure systems.
