Iran's oil storage capacity will increase by 4 million barrels in the near future, director of the customs department at Iranian Oil Terminals Company (IOTC) said, IRNA reported.
"Four storage units, each with a capacity to hold one million barrels of oil are ready in Kharg Island in the Persian Gulf," said Gholam Hossein Gerami.
There are currently 48 storage units in Kharg Island to hold a total of 28 million barrels of oil.
Light and heavy oil is carried to the island near the Persian Gulf via six pipelines, including four 30-inch pipelines as well as two pipelines with 42 and 52 inch diameters.
Plans are underway to increase storage capacity at Kharg to 34 million barrels in cooperation with private companies.
Iran has an estimated 157 billion barrels of proved crude oil reserves, representing nearly 10% of the world's crude oil reserves and 13% of reserves held by the OPEC members.
Two storage units with a total capacity of 2 million barrels, and four 500,000-barrel units are under construction by the IOTC.
The Kharg oil terminal, located on Kharg Island at the head of the Persian Gulf about 25 kilometers off the coast of Iran, is the principal sea terminal for Iranian oil.
Once the world's largest offshore crude oil terminal and the principal sea terminal for Iranian oil, the Kharg Island facilities were put out of commission during the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s following heavy bombing.
Additionally, storage capacity of Bandar Ganaveh in Bushehr Province will reach 10 million barrels by the end of the present Iranian calendar year (March 2015) upon the completion of several storage points in this southern port city.
Managing director of the IOTC Pirouz Mousavi had earlier announced that the company aims to increase oil storage capacity by inviting investors to undertake storage construction projects in the form of build–operate–transfer (BOT) and BOO (build–own–operate) contracts.
Under BOT, the private sector builds an infrastructure project, operates it and eventually transfers ownership of the project to the government. However, in BOO contracts, a private organization builds, operates and owns some, or all of a project.
