National Development Fund of Iran (NDFI) will allocate $800 million to facilitate the construction of a natural gas liquids (NGL) plant in Kharg Island in the Persian Gulf, said the director for health, safety and environment at the oil ministry Mohammad Hossein Ardeshiri, Tasnim news agency reported.
The fund is expected to be allocated in the near future, but "another $200-$300m of investment will be needed" to complete the project next year. It was reported earlier that the $600 million was to be taken from the NDFI for the development of the project. Total construction cost of the Kharg NGL plant is estimated at $2.1 billion. NDFI is Iran's sovereign wealth fund. It was founded in 2011 to transform oil and gas revenues to productive investment for future generations.
The official stressed that the plant has had a 50 percent progress, but was delayed due to the project being carried out in one phase, whereas breaking down the construction operations into two or three phases could accelerate the construction process.
Kharg Island gas and NGL recovery project is being developed by the Iranian Offshore Oil Company (IOOC). It involves the construction of a gas treatment plant and an NGL recovery facility. The two facilities will receive and process gas from both onshore and offshore sources.
According to the news portal Hydrocarbons Technology, about 300MMcfg/d of gas will be gathered from offshore fields and another 300MMcfg/d from onshore processing facilities. Onshore gas will be fed from the Aboozar, Dorood 1, 2 and 3 and Foroozan oil processing facilities. Offshore gas will come from the Aboozar, Bahregansar, Foroozan, Nowrooz and Soroosh fields.
The project will help reduce flaring of 600MMcf/d-700MMcf/d of gas from the said fields. It will also help Iran follow the guidelines of the Kyoto protocol to reduce flaring.
When fully operational, the plant is expected to prevent approximately 600 million cubic meters of gas mixed with oil to go to waste per day. Several petrochemicals including ethane, propane, pentane, butane and natural gas will be produced at the Kharg plant.
