Around 35% of Iran’s total oil exports go to European markets, director for international affairs at National Iranian Oil Company said on Friday.
“Under the present circumstances, we cannot announce an exact volume for Iran’s crude exports to Europe,” Seyyed Mohsen Qamsari was also quoted as saying by Mehr News Agency.
“On the whole, Iran has set records in oil sales to European countries in the post-sanctions period.”
Referring to the signing of new oil contracts with European customers, the official noted that oil export to Greece began earlier last week.
Based on a recent statement made by Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh, Iran’s current oil exports amount to 1.7-1.75 million barrels.
Hence, taking into account Europe’s 35% share in Iran’s crude exports, more than 500,000 are exported daily to the green continent.
The budget bill for the current Iranian year (ending March 20, 2017) calls for exporting 2.25 million barrels of oil and gas condensates per day, which target will not be met unless oil output capacity exceeds 4 million bpd.
Pointing to the fact that Iran’s export of crude oil and gas condensates is now over 2 million bpd, the oil minister said notwithstanding disagreements over Iran’s new petroleum contracts—aka IPC—lucrative contracts should be signed by the yearend.
Following oil sale contracts with the French oil and gas giant Total, the Russian Lukoil and the Spanish refiner Cepsa, Iran is expected to sign other contracts with Vitol, Eni, Royal Dutch Shell, MOL and Tupras from Switzerland, Italy, Britain, Hungary and Turkey respectively in the near future.
Tehran is working to regain market share, particularly in Europe, after the lifting of international sanctions on Jan. 16.
The sanctions cut Iranian crude exports from a peak of 2.5 million bpd before 2011 to just over 1 million bpd in recent years.
Tehran has said it would boost output immediately by 500,000 bpd and by another 500,000 bpd within a year, ultimately reaching pre-sanctions production level of around 4 million bpd seen in 2010-11.
Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Venezuela and non-OPEC Russia have agreed to freeze output at January levels in the first global oil pact in 15 years.
Zanganeh then said the freeze was "laughable", as Saudi Arabia and Russia are capping their output at 10 million barrels while asking Iran to freeze output at 1 million barrels.
Iranian sources say the country would be prepared to discuss a production pact once output reaches pre-sanctions levels.
