More than 75 percent of the country's energy needs are met through natural gas, the heating value of which equals approximately four million barrels of oil per day, the managing director of the National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC) said Monday.
Currently 63 million people, or 84 percent of the population, have access to natural gas. The figure is expected to reach 71 million or 94.5 percent by March 2018, Hamidreza Araghi was quoted by Shana news agency as saying.
According to the NIGC projections, $62.5 billion is required to process, transfer, and distribute 330 billion cubic meters of gas per annum by March 2018.
Increasing the number of gas refining companies from 71 to 90, and gas supply pipelines from 35,000km to 40,000km are among the prerequisites of such projections, the official said.
Iran holds the world’s biggest natural gas reserves, which accounts for 17% of the world's proved reserves. The world's largest gas field, South Pars, is shared between Iran and Qatar. It is estimated to hold roughly 40% of Iran's gas reserves. However, the vast majority of Iran's gas reserves are undeveloped.
Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh recently called for curbing energy consumption, noting that the unusually high levels of consumption (in winter) across the administrative, commercial, and household sectors has by far outstripped production and is simply not sustainable.
