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Earthquake disrupts Iranian oil activities

IRAN AN earthquake in southern Iran caused damage is central to Tehran’s efforts to ease reliance on
to an important oil facility over the weekend, Kharg island.
with state TV saying that production had been The pipeline will carry crude from the oil-
disrupted. fields in the West Karoun cluster, linking the
The 5.9-magnitude tremor resulted in the Gulf port city of Goreh to the Omidieh pumping
collapse of the control room roof at the Goreh station, then on to the Bahregan and Jask termi-
pump station, with Gachsaran Oil & Gas Co.’s nals for onward export.
(GOGC) managing director Houshang Seidali Phase one of the 42-inch (1,067mm) 1,000-
quoted as saying that a turbine was forced out of km pipeline will provide for the transportation
service. He added that some production was also of 460,000 bpd and 254,000 bpd of heavy and
taken offline, but did not disclose the volume. light Iranian crude, respectively. Crude will be
The Gachsaran oilfield has reserves of around moved directly from the North Azadegan, South
1.1bn barrels with GOGC reportedly producing Azadegan, Yadavaran, and Darkhovin oilfields,
in excess of 600,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil while supply from North Yaran will be moved to
and 1bn cubic feet (28mn cubic metres) per day a facility at Jofair before onward transportation
of gas from the field as well as assets in Bushehr, to the West Karoun station and beyond.
Fars, Khuzestan and Kogilouyeh-Boyrahmad. Phase 2 is also underway, which will increase
The company also operates Goreh pump sta- the capacity of the line to more than 1mn bpd.
tion and oil export facilities which feed the newly The wider project will include five pumping
built 1mn-bpd Goreh-Jask pipeline allowing stations, two pigging stations and terminals
Iran to export crude via a new terminal outside and 20 500,000-barrel tanks with a capacity of
the Strait of Hormuz. 10mn barrels of oil as well as offshore facilities
Iran’s official Shana news agency said that the for exporting crude oil.
only damage caused was to the roof of the con- It forms part of a broader move by the Islamic
trol rooms in Goreh A and C pump houses, not- Republic to increase its capabilities to export
ing that “no other significant damage has been oil from facilities outside the Strait of Hormuz,
reported in other subsidiaries of the National which has proven to be a flash point whenever
Oil Co.” tensions with neighbouring countries and/or
While the earthquake was felt at Iran’s key the US flare up. The objective is to turn Jask into
Kharg island oil terminal, through which “Iran’s key hub of oil exports,” according to Ira-
around 90% of the country’s exports currently nian President Hassan Rouhani.
flow, Shana quoted Abbas Asadrouz, managing In March, Petroleum Engineering and Devel-
director of Iranian Oil Terminals Co. as saying: opment Co. (PEDEC) CEO Touraj Dehghani
“No damage has been inflicted on facilities of said that the pipeline had reached 80% comple-
this company and activities are done normally.” tion while the first single-point mooring (SPM)
The Goreh-Jask pipeline and terminal project has been installed at Jask.™

P6 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 16 21•April•2021