Iran could send natural gas to power stations in southern Iraq during the current calendar year, Iran’s deputy Oil Minister for International Affairs Ali Majedisaid, adding thata pipeline from southern Iran across the border to power stations in Basra province is “currently under construction”.
The project is aimed at supplying Al-Baghdad and Al-Mansouriyah power plants in Iraq with 25 million cubic metres per day of natural gas.
The pipeline will stretch from the Iranian port city of Asaluyeh, near the South Pars gas field, to Iraq.
Iran has boasted of its potential to reach new gas customers through its massive South Pars gas complex which it shares with Qatar.
European officials have brushed off Tehran’s gas offerings because of sanctions imposed on the Iranian energy sector. Though Iran secured some sanctions relief through an interim nuclear deal with Western powers last year, the US government in particular has said Iran is not yet open for business.
Majedi said the pipeline from Asaluyeh could reach into the Syrian market when conditions return to normal in the war-torn country.
In April, Tehran said work on the construction of Iranian part of a gas pipeline to Iraq was 75% complete and the pipeline would become operational within four months. After the completion of the project Iran can export 5 million cubic metres of natural gas to Iraq in the first phase and the exports will reach 10 million cubic metres in next stages.
Fadel Gheit, a senior oil and gas analyst at Oppenheimer in New York, told New Europe on 8 May that Iraqis use a lot of oil to generate electricity. “It’s a lot cleaner and cheaper to use gas and they can spare the oil for export so it makes a lot of sense,” Gheit said.
He argued that the best thing for all the countries in the Middle East is to export their oil and try to find substitutes to burning oil to generate electricity by switching to natural gas. “Obviously they don’t have nuclear but by switching from oil to gas will free up a lot of oil for the export market,” he said.
Gas from Iran would feed Iraqi electrical plants because Iraq has very little gas and needs a stable supply of gas from Iran which has one of the largest gas reserves in the world, the Oppenheimer oil and gas analyst said.
http://www.neurope.eu/article/iran-close-exporting-gas-iraq