Households consumed a whopping 480 million cubic meters of natural gas in one day (Thursday) as the cold weather continued to sweep across the country, spokesman of the National Iranian Gas Company said.
"Gas consumption has been 55 million cubic meters above average levels over the past two days. Nevertheless, gas supply to power plants and industries has not been interrupted," Majid Boujarzadeh was quoted Friday as saying by IRNA.
"Normal gas consumption in the household sector stands at around 425 mcm," he said. Iran's gas production is above 800 million cubic meters per day.
According to the official, close to 106 mcm and 110 mcm of gas of the fuel was delivered to power plants and industries respectively on Thursday, thus the total consumption in household sector, power plants and indusries amounted to around 700 mcm.
Boujarzadeh noted that if subscribers reduce home temperature by 2 degrees centigrade an estimated 50 mcm of gas can be saved every day -- equivalent to the gas produced by two phases of South Pars Gas Field per day.
Almost 40% of Middle East’s gas is consumed in Iran, an unreasonably high level by any standard. The household sector is the largest consumer followed by power plants.
The NIGC spokesman said exports to neighboring states, namely Turkey and Iraq, have also not been affected so far. More than 90% of the gas export, or 30 mcm/d, goes to Turkey.
"Daily export to Baghdad has increased to12 mcm/d," he said.
With a population of 80 million, Iran burns more than 140 billion cubic meters of gas every year, not far from China, the world’s second-largest economy and the most populous (1.38 billion) country in the world, which consumed 191 billion cubic meters in 2015.
