TEHRAN (Dow Jones)--Iran plans to raise its refining capacity to 3.3 million barrels a day by 2012 to become the largest oil refiner in the Persian Gulf region, the state Irna news agency reports Tuesday.
Iran is currently making the largest investments in the refinery sector in the region and ranks second in refining capacity after Saudi Arabia, Irna cites the director of refinery affairs at the National Iranian Oil Refining and Distribution Co., Aminollah Eskandari, as saying.
Eskandari said Iran plans to build seven new refineries at a cost of 15.5 billion euros in order to double the country's refining capacity. Studies for the construction of the refineries have been completed and actual construction is 4%-20% complete, Irna reports.
Iran's refinery capacity will reach 3.3 million barrels a day by 2012 while Saudi refining capacity is expected to reach 3 million barrels per day by 2015, Eskandari said, according to Irna.
"Given the economic growth of big consumers such as India and China, oil producing countries have made huge investments in oil refining," Irna quotes Eskandari as saying.
Most of the refinery projects will come on stream in 2012 and all oil products produced at the country's Hormuz refinery, which has a capacity of 300,000 barrels a day, will be exported, reports Irna.
Iran also plans to export some products from its Bandar Abbas and Khuzestan refineries. The country's nine refineries have capacity to process 1.75 million barrels a day of crude, Irna reports.
The country's Abadan refinery, with a refining capacity of 425,000 barrels a day, is the largest refinery in Iran, Irna quotes Eskandari as saying.
Iran's nine existing refineries produce on a daily basis 43 million liters of gasoline, 8 million liters of liquefied gas, 82 million liters of gas oil, 21 million liters of kerosene and 75 million liters of fuel oil, according to Irna.