The Iranian and Venezuelan joint venture company, Veniran, will stop operating in domestic petrochemical projects due to a lack of funding by the Venezuelan side, managing director of the Persian Gulf Petrochemical Industrial Co. (PGPIC) said.
"Veniran's operations in the Apadana Petrochemical project and Bid Boland 2 Refinery [in south Iran] will come to a halt, but the company will not be dissolved," Adel Salimnejad said, implying the opportunity for participation of newcomers in the two projects, IRNA reported Monday.
Iran and Venezuela signed a contract in 2007 to construct a methanol-producing plant in Asaluyeh under the Veniran [Venezuela-Iran] joint-venture. The plant was to be built in three years, but the project has yet to be completed.
Repeated delays of Venezuelan investors to fulfill their commitments prompted Iran to end cooperation with the South American contractors on current projects. Veniran in the Pars Special Economic Energy Zone was touted as the biggest Venezuelan overseas oil contract at the time.
Plans call for launch of the first phase of Bid Boland 2 Refinery in the Persian Gulf by 2017 with the capacity to process 150,000 cubic meters of gas per day. Veniran has 5 percent stake in the refinery project.
In addition, close to $12 million in foreign exchange and 350 billion rials so far has been invested in the Apadana complex. It is set to come online in three years.
Iran and Venezuela signed several oil, gas and petrochemical agreements during the era of the late Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, such as establishing a joint oil tanker company, developing oil and gas fields in the two countries (phase 12 of South Pars gas field in the Persian Gulf and Venezuela's Dobokubi) and building an oil refinery in Syria. But the joint projects did not come to fruition.
