New South Pars Platforms to Be Launched by March

The installation of an offshore platform for gas extraction from Phase 20 of South Pars Gas Field in the Persian Gulf started on Monday in line with plans to fast-track gas production from the giant joint field, the operations manager of Pars Oil and Gas Company said.

“The platform, which weighs 2,600 tons, will have the capacity to extract 1 billion cubic feet (over 28 million cubic meters) of natural gas per day,” Ehsan Alikhani was quoted as saying by Mehr News Agency.

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.

Underscoring that all stages of designing and building the platform were accomplished by Iranian experts, Alikhani added that Phase 20’s platform is expected to be fully installed and launched by March 2017.

This is the fourth platform of South Pars to become operational since March.

The official noted that six platforms, three of which have already been installed, will be launched in the current Iranian year that ends in March 2017.

South Pars officials say the field’s production will reach 540 million cubic meters per day this year with new phases going on stream.

Alikhani said the Phase 17 platform will be loaded in Bandar Abbas, Hormozgan Province, by mid-November.

He stressed that the last platform to be installed this year is that of South Pars’ Phase 19, whose construction process has been completed.

In July, South Pars’ 19A platform, weighing 2,750 tons, was successfully installed by domestic contractors in an operation that lasted about two hours.

POGC experts, along with Iran Shipbuilding And Offshore Industries Company specialists, managed to do so, using Oceanic 5000 crane ship and Abouzar 110 vessel.

About three months ago, the 2,700-ton platform of Phase 21 was successfully installed to produce 28 million cubic meters of gas a day.

The gas extraction platform of Phase 18 was also installed and started production in only 62 days, registering a record.

The 18B platform’s output currently stands at 14 million cubic meters per day. The platform weighs about 2,600 tons.

According to Alikhani, six platforms had also become operational last year.