Iran drills first well at new giant offshore gas field
TEHRAN, Feb 18 (AFP) - Iran started drilling the first well Thursday
at the vast South Pars gas field in the Persian Gulf, the official IRNA
news agency reported.
Iranian President Mohammad Khatami watched the operations and broadcast
a message thanking the Iranian engineers working on the project.
South Pars, which is shared between Iran and Qatar, measures 3,700
square kilometers (1,480 square miles) with reserves of about 10,000 billion
cubic meters (350,000 billion cubic feet) of natural gas.
Iran intends to use the gas field to increase its exports of non-oil
products -- plastics and chemicals -- as well as for energy production.
Iran has total reserves of more than 24,000 billion cubic meters (840,000
billion cubic feet) of gas, about 15 percent of the world total, second
only to Russia.
Most of Iran's gas reserves are still untapped, mainly for lack of
finance and facilities for transporting it to consumer countries.
Links
