“In a recent meeting with the oil minister, he elaborately explained on plans to explore oil and gas fields in the Caspian Sea,” Ali-Asghar Yousefnejad stated.

Iran announced on December 11 it has discovered a large gas field in the Caspian Sea with at least 50 trillion cubic feet (some 1.4 trillion cubic meters) of reserves.

The field, in waters 700 meters deep, lies wholly within Iran’s territorial waters, Oil Minister Rostam Qasemi explained.

He added excluding this new discovery Iran has 11 trillion cubic meters of proven gas reserves in the Caspian Sea.

Qasemi also announced that Iran is now the sole country in the region which has found access to the technology to drill wells in deep waters.

Previously, deputy oil minister Mohsen Khojaste-Mehr told the Mehr News Agency that extensive operations are underway to explore new gas deposits across the country which will probably increase the country’s proven gas reserves.

The Fifth Five-Year Development Plan (2010-2015) has envisaged boosting the country’s gas production by 250 million cubic meters per day to reach 1.4 billion cubic meters per day.

Second to Russia, Iran holds the world’s second-largest gas reserves, according to the BP Statistical Review of World Energy in June.

Source: www.tehrantimes.com

Speaking on the sidelines of his visit to Beijing Oil Industry University, Gholamreza Rashed said the two countries will take practical steps to launch joint educational and industrial projects before October 2012.

He added that the two sides have agreed to carry out joint research on oil and gas industries and launch post-graduate (PhD) courses in relevant fields of study.

Rashed also signed an agreement with president of the Beijing Oil Industry University, Zhang Laibin who said Iran had as an important role in supplying energy to developing countries.

Iran’s Oil Industry University is currently working with similar universities in France, Canada and Australia and holds joint educational courses with them.

Iran is OPEC’s second largest oil producer and the fourth largest crude oil exporter.

The country holds the world’s third-largest proven oil reserves and the second-largest natural gas reserves.

Source: www.tehrantimes.com

The minister, Rostam Qasemi, had been the chief of the economic conglomerate until his appointment last week to the government post.

The economic conglomerate, Khatam-ol-Anbiya, is the Revolutionary Guard’s most important economic unit and is the largest contractor of government projects including major oil and gas projects.

“Khatam-ol-Anbiya … should convert to a successor to foreign big companies,” Qasemi said, according to IRNA.

His remark is seen as a reaction to the pressure that sanctions are putting on foreign companies working in Iran. Several oil companies, including Total SA and Royal Dutch Shell, have withdrawn from the country over the past years. Some Chinese and Indian companies are still working there.

Qasemi said Khatam-ol-Anbia should be improved and said he still feels that he is still working for the Guard.

“I am assigned to the Oil Ministry, but I am obsessed by the Guards,” he said, according to IRNA.

Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafari, chief of the Guards, also sought a bigger economic role for the unit.

“The Guards should have a pioneer role in the economic fronts in the country,” Jafari said, according to the semiofficial Mehr news agency. “There is a special expectation from the Oil Ministry. The sources should be spent for infrastructure projects.”

Khatam-ol-Anbiya has some $25 billion contracts in various oil and gas projects in Iran.

The United States accuses Khatam-ol-Anbiya of funneling revenues from its construction business back into Iran’s nuclear program, which Washington suspects aims to develop atomic weapons.

Tehran denies Western allegations that it is pursuing nuclear weapons and says its program is for peaceful purposes such as power generation.

Iran is in need of both foreign investment and technology to upgrade its vital oil industry, which represents some 80 percent of its foreign revenue.

Qasemi said Saturday that Iran will need some $40 billion in the current year to develop oil and gas fields.

Source: www.google.com

The contract was inked by the Iranian and German officials on the sidelines of the 16th Oil, Gas, Refining and Petrochemicals Exhibition in Tehran in recent days.

Tehran had earlier signed a similar deal with a French company, but later annulled the contract after the French failed to fulfill their undertakings.

Iran, which sits on the world’s second largest reserves of both oil and gas, is facing US sanctions over its civilian nuclear program.

Iranian officials have dismissed US sanctions as inefficient, saying that they are finding Asian and European partners instead.

Earlier this week, a senior Iranian oil official had announced that the country is in talks with foreign firms and companies to funnel a huge sum of foreign investment into the development of its oil and gas fields.

“We are in talks with many foreign companies to attract $20 bln of investment,” Managing-Director of the National Iranian Offshore Oil Company (NIOOC) Mahmoud Zirakchianzadeh said in a news conference on the sidelines of the 16th Oil, Gas, Refining and Petrochemicals Exhibition here in Tehran on Saturday.

Also, last year, a senior Iranian oil official said that the country has a comprehensive plan to accelerate implementation of oil and gas projects in shared onshore and offshore fields.

Managing-Director of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) Ahmad Qalebani said that the company intends to accelerate implementation of upstream projects to develop shared fields and to increase output.

Iran and Qatar share the oil and gas reserves of the giant South Pars gas field in the Persian Gulf. The Iranian share of the field has reserves of about 14 trillion cubic meters (46.2 trillion cubic feet) of gas, which accounts for about eight percent of total world reserves.

The Iranian Oil Ministry has defined over 20 phases of development for the South Pars gas field.

In June, the four largest oil and gas firms of Iran signed contracts for developing the remaining phases of the giant South Pars gas field, including phases 13, 14, 19, 22, 23 and 24 in June.

The Industrial Development and Renovation Organization of Iran (IDRO) and Petropars, Iranian Petro Paidar and Petrosina companies are due to execute the project for the development of phases 13, 14, 19, 22, 23, and 24 of the South Pars Special Energy Zone (SPSEZ).

In December, the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) inked a deal with a South Korean company on the development of phases 17 and 18 of the giant gas field.

Late in December, Iran announced that it plans to invest billions of dollars to develop two major phases of the South Pars gas field.

The Iranian government has agreed to invest an additional $1.5 billion in developing phases 9 and 10 of South Pars gas filed.

The investment in the two phases will reach $4.149 billion from the current $2.597 billion, resulting from a recent ratification by the government.

When all phases of the South Pars field become operational, the annual revenue of the field will soar to $100 billion, raising Iran’s gas output to 1.1 billion cubic meters per day.

Source: www.english.farsnews.com

The Islamic Republic, the world’s fourth-largest oil producer, has been hit by international sanctions over its disputed nuclear work, which the United States and its allies fear is a cover to build bombs. Iran denies this.

Many Western companies, with the necessary expertise and capital to develop Iran’s energy sector, have suspended their activities in the country because of sanctions.

Iranian authorities have dismissed any impact of sanctions on the economy. “We will not sit idle in protracted negotiations with foreign companies,” said Deputy Oil Minister Mohsen Khojasteh Mehr, the Jam-e Jam website reported.

The Iranian oil ministry confirmed the report.

Earlier this year, Iraq signed a deal with Russia’s Gazprom (GAZP.MM: Quote), Turkey’s TPAO, Korea’s KOGAS 036460.KS) and Malaysia’s Petronas [PETR.UL] to develop its eastern Badrah oilfield with estimated reserves of 100 million barrels of oil.

Khojasteh Mehr said the master development plan for the joint fields had been completed and the speedy development of them was the priority of the oil ministry, displaying Iran’s concern on falling behind in joint fields.

The official said drilling of Azar field, called Badrah in Iraq will begin soon. The field is near Iraq’s border with Iran.

Norway’s Norsk Hydro (NHY.OL: Quote) and Lukoil (LKOH.MM: Quote) worked together on an exploration contract for the Azar field and discovered oil there in 2005. The companies later said the field holds 2 billion barrels of oil and according to an Iranian oil official it could produce up to 55,000 barrels per day (bpd).

Iran, which is 40 percent dependent on oil income, needs around $25 billion of foreign investment annually to develop its oil and gas industry.

Source: www.af.reuters.com