POGC Expects Faster, Cheaper Iran's South Pars Rebuild

Iran expects to speed up and reduce the cost of repairing South Pars gas facilities damaged in recent wars by leaning on domestic manufacturers and drawing on lessons from a previous rehabilitation project, a senior oil official said on Monday.

Touraj Dehqani, managing director of Pars Oil and Gas Company (POGC), which operates Iran’s largest gas production complex, said several refineries at South Pars were hit during two wars, reducing the country’s processing capacity.

“Restoring this capacity quickly is a direct step toward securing stable gas supply, especially during the cold months,” Dehghani was quoted as saying by Shana, the oil ministry’s news agency. He said Iranian manufacturers are playing a key role in the reconstruction work, which could help recover part of the network’s capacity before winter.

Immediately after the damage, initial estimates put the reconstruction timeline at three to five years and the cost at around US$5 billion, Dehqani said. But he said technical reviews and experience gained from the recent rehabilitation of Phase 14 of South Pars have prompted a change in approach.

“With timely funding and resolution of implementation bottlenecks, we can optimize the reconstruction process for the refineries damaged in the Ramadan war, using the technical and managerial model applied in Phase 14,” he said, referring to the conflict that began in October 2023. “That experience is now the basis for our revised execution policy.”

South Pars, which Iran shares with Qatar, accounts for the bulk of Iran’s natural gas output. Prolonged outages at the field could strain domestic supplies, particularly during peak winter demand. - Kayhan