Poles Looking to Extract Crude in Kermanshah

The National Iranian Oil Company is studying the development proposal of Poland’s PGNiG for Sumar Oilfield in western Iran.

Karim Zobeidi, NIOC's deputy director for planning, is leading a team of experts in evaluating Poland's development plan for the relatively small onshore oilfield, NIOC said on its website on Wednesday.

Located in Kermanshah Province that shares borders with Iraq in the west, Sumar is estimated to contain 475 million barrels of crude oil in place, 70 million barrels of which are deemed recoverable.

According to reports, production at the oilfield began in 2012, though the rate of extraction has remained below 10,000 barrels per day.

Officials say the field's deposits are largely made up of light crude, which has high demand in global markets.

According to reports, Khatam al-Anbiya Construction Headquarters took over the development of Sumar Oilfield in 2015, but the project has since made little progress.

Last year, a memorandum of understanding was signed in Tehran between NIOC and PGNiG on studying Sumar Oilfield.

Bijan Alipour, the managing director of National Iranian South Oil Company, said in January that PGNiG was willing to invest in Iran’s oil and gas upstream sector and talks were underway to assign the development of an unnamed field to the company, Mehr News Agency reported.

Pointing to the names of international energy companies that have been qualified to bid for new oil and gas projects, the official noted that besides Total, Shell, Eni and Gazprom as well as Asian companies like CNPC, Inpex, KOGAS and Petronas, the list includes PGNiG that has little history in Iran’s energy market.

PGNiG deals with the exploration and production as well as storage, distribution and sales of natural gas and crude oil.

Alipour noted that as soon as negotiations with PGNiG come to fruition, a cooperation agreement based on the Iran Petroleum Contract, the new framework for oil and gas contracts, will be signed.

Salbali Karimi, managing director of Iranian Central Oil Fields Company, has said that given the field’s proximity to the city of Naftshahr in Qasr-e Shirin County, Sumar’s oil output will be supplied to Kermanshah Refinery.