TEHRAN (FNA)- Iran plans to put into operation a great natural gas liquid (NGL) plant by March, Head of the Khatam-al Anbiya Construction Headquarters Saeed Mohammad said, adding that the plant will collect flare gases from Southwestern oilfields.
Mohammad said that the first phase of NGL 3200 project would use 250 million cubic feet (7.07 million cubic meters) of flare gases collected from six oilfields located in the West of the Karoun River.
He noted that the NGL 3200 is a megaproject in Iran’s oil industry, saying it would create thousands of permanent jobs while seriously improving the living conditions for local people in Khuzestan province.
Iran has three major NGL projects that would feed on flares, the gases burnt during oil production process. The country burns nearly 13 billion cubic meters of flares each year, the fourth largest in the world according to a study in 2019.
Construction of NGL 3200 comes despite many odds faced by the Iranian energy sector because of illegal American sanctions. The progress of the project has reached a record rate of 3.5% per month, he said, adding that even the French giant Total had failed to reach such a speed in projects it was awarded in Iran before the sanctions.
In relevant remarks in mid-June, Spokesman of the National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC) Mohammadi Asgari announced that the average gas production at Iran’s refineries stood at 674 million cubic meters per day.
"This figure shows a growth of 24 mcm/d as compared to last year's natural gas production which was 650 mcm/d," Asgari said.