Iran ups oil, gas revenues

Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh announced that the country’s oil and gas revenues have increased in the first nine months of the current Iranian year (ends March 20). “Iran has collected $34 billion from oil and gas sales in the first nine months of the current year,” Zanganeh told reporters on Thursday. He stressed that sale of gas liquids has experienced an increase of 100,000 barrels year-on-year. Earlier this week, Iranian Deputy Oil Minister Mansour Moazzami said leading international oil firms have voiced their enthusiasm for expanding cooperation with Iran to have more share in the country's lucrative oil market. "Most of the talks held with well-known international oil companies came due to their demands. No conclusion has yet been made on determining price of energy," Moazzami said. "We have started good contacts with well-known international oil companies which are interested in investment in Iran. A great number of talks and meetings between the corporations and Iranian officials came due to the companies' requests," he added. He further reiterated that the country does not have any problem in crude export." A total of 18 heavy and extra heavy oilfields have so far been discovered in Iran, including Ferdowsi oil field in the Persian Gulf, which is one of the country's biggest heavy oil fields with proven reserves of more than 31bln barrels. Iran's total in-place oil reserves have been estimated at more than 560bln barrels with about 140bln barrels of extractable oil. Moreover, heavy and extra heavy varieties of crude oil account for roughly 70-100bln barrels of the total reserves. Iran holds the world's third largest proven oil reserves and the second-largest natural gas reserves.