The energy ministry is open to power generation from associated petroleum gas (APG) and will guarantee the purchase of such electricity, deputy energy minister Houshang Falahatian said, Fars news agency reported Friday.
"We have plans to purchase electricity from privately-owned power plants, whether fueled by natural or associated gas," he said, noting that the ministry is ready to guarantee the purchase of electricity from power plants "should the private sector express interest," he noted.
Chitchian said his ministry also aims to maintain steady supply of fuel to power plants, and close to 100,000 million cubic meters (mcm) of gas is delivered to power plants per day.
"If we continue to deliver 100 mcm of gas and 400 mcm of liquefied fuels to power plants every day, we will move past the winter."
Despite the ministry's guarantee to buy APG-fired electricity, the Power Generation and Transmission Company (Tavanir) "has no plans to generate electricity via APG," managing director of Tavanir said.
"We have received no invitation to participate in an APG auction and have no plans to use this type of gas for power generation," Homayoun Haeri was quoted by ILNA as saying. "The National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) provides us with natural gas."
He suggested that the MAPNA Group could be a potential consumer of APG in the near future. MAPNA is a consortium of several companies involved in construction and installation of energy production machinery.
The NIOC announced last week that it is to put 20 mcm of APG on auction for private investors by January 9.
APG, or associated gas, is a form of natural gas which is found with deposits of petroleum. It is often released as a waste product from the petroleum extraction industry. When it is burnt off in gas flares, it is referred to as flare gas.
Iran aims to prevent the flaring of APG as it is a pollutant, a source of global warming and a waste of a valuable fuel source. It is third in the world in flaring APG after Russia and Nigeria, burning approximately 20 mcm of APG to waste every year.
