As soon as offshore platforms 21, 19A and 18B are hooked up to onshore refining complexes and platforms 20, 17B and 19B go on stream, 140 million cubic meters a day will be added to Iran's daily gas output from South Pars Gas Field, currently standing at 430 mcm per day, managing director of Pars Oil and Gas Company said.
"Plans have been made to launch South Pars platforms 20, 17B and 19B by the end of the current Iranian fiscal year that started in March," Ali Akbar Shabanpour was also quoted as saying by Shana.
Elaborating on technical issues, he added that completing phases 17, 19 and 20 tops POGC's priority list as each of them can produce twice as much gas as standard phases.
According to Shabanpour, platforms 20, 17B and 19B are under construction in Khorramshahr and Bandar Abbas fabrication yard in southern Iran with the help of domestic experts.
Moreover, plans call for their installation in the near future as separate wells, with a depth of 4,000 meters, have been drilled for each platform.
The official said extracting gas comprises complicated procedures, include constructing, installing and launching platforms as well as hooking up offshore facilities to onshore refineries and synchronizing them.
Production Chain
Asked about procedures to complete the gas production chain in South Pars Gas Field, Shabanpour noted that as soon as platforms are established, offshore pipelines will be filled with gas, water and gas condensates, which are then transferred to onshore refineries to be converted to value-added products such as sweet gas, ethane, propane and sulfur.
"Phases 17 and 18 are designed to produce 50 million cubic meters of gas per day. So far, 22 wells have been drilled in the offshore sector of the two phases to deliver natural gas to onshore processing facilities through a 220-kilometer pipeline," Hassan Bouyeri, director of South Pars phases 17 and 18, said.
Bouyeri noted that the two phases have made more than 90% physical progress and all four refining units are now operational, producing close to 30 mcm per day of natural gas.
According to official reports, Iran produced 130 billion cubic meters of gas last year, or roughly 356 mcm/d of annual output, are planned to reach 236 billion cubic meters, or almost 650 million cubic meters a day by March 2018.
Iran has close to 34 trillion cubic meters of natural gas reserves, which is about 18% of the total global natural gas reserves. This means Iran has the potential to become a major player in the natural gas market when all sanctions are lifted by the yearend.
Iran's strategic location can help meet the growing natural gas demand of Asian countries like India, China and Pakistan and is, therefore, planning a number of gas pipelines to boost exports.
The country is planning to boost gas production capacity from around 430 million cubic meters per day at present to 1 billion cubic meters a day in 2017 and 1.2 bcm/d by 2020.
South Pars is the world’s largest gas field, shared between 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, which measures 6,000 square kilometers.
