by Staff Reporter
May 15, 2013 (TSR) – Iran has allocated 5.5 trillion rials (about $450 million) to oil and gas exploration projects in the current Iranian calendar year, according to Hormoz Qalavand the head of exploration at the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) who announced it on Tuesday.
According to a proposed plan, which started on March 21, up to 400 million barrels of crude oil and 125 billion cubic meters of natural gas should be explored by the end of the year, IRNA quoted Qalavand as saying.
Exploration operations are being conducted mainly at northwestern and northeastern parts of the country, he noted.
“As part of a new government policy to boost energy production, we are currently investing $100 billion in new oil and gas exploration and production,” he added.
Some 1.891 billion barrels of oil and 388 billion cubic feet of natural gas were discovered in the past Iranian calendar year, he said.
Iran has announced that it will implement 11 plans by the Iranian calendar month of Mordad 1392 (July 22-August 22, 2013) with the goal of boosting oil production by 175,000 barrels per day.
In October 2012, Iranian Oil Minister Rostam Qasemi said that Iran is investing $100 billion to boost its oil and gas production.
Qasemi added that the country’s oil output is projected to increase by 1.5 million barrels per day by 2016.
Iran has the world’s fourth-largest reserves of recoverable oil, after Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, and Canada.
With 34 trillion cubic meters of natural gas reserves, Iran has the world’s second-largest natural gas reserves after Russia.
