The National Iranian Drilling Company is accelerating operations to complete the drilling of wells at eight oil and gas fields, deputy director of National Iranian Drilling Company said.
Mehran Makvandi added that NIDC’s operations include drillings in Phase 14 of South Pars Gas Field, Azadegan, South Yaran, Azar, Sohrab, Darkhovein, Kish and Soufikom oilfields as well as the overhaul of three South Pars wells, Shana reported.
“A total of 121 wells are planned to be drilled,” Makvandi said, adding that works on 50 wells started in mid-February after NIDC received the much-needed equipment to carry out the drilling.
“Drilling the wells of South Azadegan Oilfield is picking up pace and will be completed within six months,” he said.
With an estimated 60% progress in development, South Azadegan is among Iran’s attractive fields for foreign companies.
French giant Total is said to have been in months-long negotiations to win the right to develop the field.
Earlier this month, the Research Institute of Petroleum Industry–a subsidiary of Iran’s Oil Ministry—signed a memorandum of understanding with Total, based on which, Iran will provide the company with information on South Azadegan.
South Azadegan Oilfield is located 80 km west of Ahvaz in Khuzestan Province along the Iran-Iraq border and shared by the two states.
It was one of the projects introduced to foreign contractors in a major conference last year, but the future of the project is shrouded in doubt, as it is not clear whether Tehran plans to hand over South Azadegan to Total or put it out to tender sometime this year.
NIDC is concentrating on South Pars, which is pivotal to the government of President Hassan Rouhani’s economic plans. The company is working to deploy two offshore platforms of Phase 14 in less than a year from now.
Phase 14 is not among the high-priority phases of South Pars. According to Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh, all South Pars phases are expected to become operational by August 2017, except Phase 14.
South Pars is the world’s largest gas field shared by Iran and Qatar, covering an area of 3,700 square kilometers of Iran’s territorial waters in the Persian Gulf. It adjoins Qatar’s North Field that measures 6,000 square kilometers.
The Islamic Republic has vowed to boost gas production from around 400 million cubic meters per day at present to more than 1 billion cubic meters a day in two years and boost output to 1.2 bcm/d by 2020.
