Gas Pipeline for northern regions

Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh inaugurated a gas pipeline on Tuesday that will ensure a steady supply of clean fossil fuel to northern regions, particularly in the cold season when demand soars.

The pipeline, stretching from the city of Damghan in Semnan Province to Neka in Mazandaran Province by the Caspian Sea, will have the capacity to transfer 40 million cubic meters of gas to the northern regions, ILNA reported.

Mazandaran Province, Iran’s seventh most populous province, consumes between 22 mcm/d and 26 mcm/d of gas.

The country’s daily gas consumption has reached 700 million cubic meters.

The project is part of an expansive network of pipelines used to transfer natural gas from the giant South Pars field in the Persian Gulf all the way to the northern regions.

Iran faced a shortage of gas supply in January after its northern neighbor Turkmenistan unexpectedly halted exports.

According to reports, Turkmenistan exported 10-12 million cubic meters per day of gas to Iran, which accounted for less than 2% of the domestic gas demand.

but the cutback took a toll on Iran’s residential and industrial consumers as demand typically surges in winter for power generation and heating purposes.

Construction of the pipeline commenced following Turkmenistan’s first violation of its gas contract with Iran in 2007.

Demand for natural gas significantly rose in Iran in 2007, as the country was gripped by unseasonably cold temperatures that year.

Taking advantage of the conundrum, Turkmenistan jacked up the price of gas it sold to Iran from $40 per 1,000 cubic meters to $360.