Natural gas delivery to petrochemical companies has been of the ascending order over the past two years.
According to Fars news agency, in 2017 petrochemical plants took 102 mcm of gas as feedstock on a daily basis. The figure rose to112 mcm/d in 2018 – up 9.3%.
The National Iranian Gas Company supplied 186 million cubic meters of gas per day to power plants in 2018, the same volume as in 2017.
Iran has abundant natural gas deposits and not only is it more cost-effective to use gas for power generation instead of liquid fuels such as diesel and mazut, it is a clean energy source and causes less air pollution.
The government has boosted gas production, especially in the giant South Pars Gas Field in the Persian Gulf, to meet the growing demand from power and petrochemical plants.
South Pars, the world's largest gas field shared between Iran and Qatar, was developed in 24 phases of which 22 are operating and phase 14 is under construction.
Phases 13 and 22-24 became operational last month, raising the field's output to 610 million cubic meters per day.
Referring to gas exports, the news agency said in 2017 NIGC exported 27 mcm of natural gas per day. That volume declined to 24 mcm/d a year later.
The company's import declined from11 mcm/d in 2017 to 6 mcm/d in 2018.Under swap deals, Iran exports electricity to Armenia and Azerbaijan in winter and imports it when domestic demand soars in summer.
NIGC has the capacity to daily produce upwards of 800 million cubic meters of gas. Most of its output is used to meet domestic demand. Iran’s total annual consumption exceeds 200 billion cubic meters.
