Baku, Azerbaijan, June 21
By Emil Ilgar – Trend:
The recovery rate of the South Pars gas field’s oil layer is 3-4 percent now, but Iran plans to increase this figure to at least 15 percent, CEO of Petro Iran Development Company (PEDCO) Raham Qasemi told SHANA June 21.
He said that currently 25,000 barrels per day of oil is being produced from the oil layer of South Pars, but the figure is projected to reach 80,000 b/d in the second phase.
Iran inaugurated the project in April and some 1.6 mb/d oil has been extracted as of now. PEDCO is the project’s operator, but Iran has been negotiating with Danish Maersk Group to deliver the project to them.
The field’s oil layer contains 14 billion barrels of in-situ reserves, but Qasemi said that currently only 3-4 percent of its reserves are recoverable.
“The field strongly needs water injections. Only a progressive company like Maersk can develop the project and increase the recovery rate to at least about 15 percent,” he said, adding that Iran has only discussed the cooperation issue with Maersk.
Ali Kardor, Iran’s deputy oil minister, said May 31 that Iran rejected the preliminary proposal of Maersk on the second phase of the South Pars oil layer development project. However, he added that talks are underway with the Danish company.
The proposal was not acceptable in terms of extraction model and oil recovery factor, Kardor, who heads the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC), said.
Raham Qasemi also said Iran plans to increase the oil extraction from the layer to 150,000 b/d in future, but this depends on result of the studies on projects.
Maersk told Trend in March that it continues talks with Iran to take part in possible oil projects, including South Pars’ oil layer, but no agreement have been reached so far.
