Tehran, PIN, 12/05/2010

TEHRAN (Shana): Iranian petroleum minister says all the South Pars gas field's phases will come on stream before the fifth five-year development plan (2010-2015) ends.

Visiting some platforms of the South Pars gas field phases on Tuesday, the petroleum minister, Dr. Mirkazemi said working on 12, 15, 16, 17 and 18 phases have been accelerated and in a meeting with the South Pars managers he would talk about putting in motion the idle phases.

Mirkazemi said operations in the platforms of the 9 and 10 phases are underway and we are trying to shorten the completion period of the two phases.

Iranian petroleum minister traveled to Assalouye on Tuesday to visit the South Pars project and talk with the oil industry managers at the Pars Special Economic Energy Zone (PSEEZ).

Earlier managing director of the Pars Oil and Gas Company (POGC) Ali Vakili had said the company plans to extract 265 million cubic meters of gas per day from the giant South Pars gas field during the current year.

He pointed out that average daily production of gas from the field has been 200 million cubic meters up to now this year and the company plans to raise the amount to 265 million cubic meters a day.

Mr. Vakili had said that by starting production from all the defined phases, output from the field would stand at 650 million cubic meters per day.

South Pars is a natural gas condensate field located in the Persian Gulf. It is the world's largest gas field, shared between Iran and Qatar.