Iran currently swaps as much as 47 million cubic meters of natural gas with its neighboring states per day.
Hamidreza Araqi, managing director of National Iranian Gas Company, made the announcement in an interview with ILNA in Tehran on Saturday.
"Gas swap from Turkmenistan to Azerbaijan stands at 6 mcm per day," he added.
Despite being embroiled in a gas row that has lingered since 2016, Tehran and Ashgabat have a swap deal to transfer Turkmenistan's hydrocarbons through Iran.
"Tehran filed a lawsuit in the International Court of Arbitration against Turkmenistan for cutting off its natural gas supply in 2016, after unsuccessful efforts to resolve the issue through negotiations," he said, noting that as long as the verdict is not issued, gas deals will only be limited to swap operations.
"The company is exporting as much as 40 mcm of gas per day to target destinations in Iraq, Armenia and Turkey," he added.
On plans to boost exports, he stressed that supplying gas to neighboring states is NIGC's priority.
"Transferring the fuel to Europe is not economically viable, that is why talks are underway to develop a partnership with Turkey to share the benefits of gas pipelines that pass through the country to Europe," he said.
According to the official, gas export is not exposed to the US sanctions that have been engineered to hit Iran's oil sector after US President Donald Trump withdrew from Iran's nuclear deal in May.
"NIGC's financial transactions are carried out through banking channels," Araqi said, noting that the firm has boosted gas production to around 880 million cubic meters per day, with over two-thirds of this amount coming from South Pars, the world's largest gas field shared by Iran and Qatar in the Persian Gulf.
--- Grid Expansion
According to the official, there are 56,000 villages and small towns that can join the national gas grid, of which 26,000 or 73% have already been connected to the network.
"NIGC will cover 90% of the small town by March 2019," he said, noting that there are dilapidated houses in some villages, which make it impossible to provide them with natural gas, yet they will be supplied with other alternative sources of fuel, such as compressed natural gas.
Referring to gas grid expansion in Khorasan Razavi Province, he added that 7,368 kilometers of pipelines have been laid in the region in the past six years.
The NIGC chief noted that 853 villages have joined the grid in the province in the period.
The number of consumers using the fuel in the province stands at 2.1, of whom 414,000 are dwelling in villages.
According to the official, close to 36,000 kilometers of high-pressure gas pipes have been laid in different parts of the country, which will be extended to 45,000 km by 2026.
Underscoring the importance of developing national gas infrastructures, the official said the more the network is extended, the faster gas will be transferred from far-flung refineries to urban and suburban areas.
