Iran, Iraq Seal Deal to Develop 2 Joint Oil Fields

Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh announced on Sunday that Tehran and Baghdad have reached an agreement to jointly develop two shared oilfields, namely Naft Shahr and Khorramshahr.

Zanganeh broke the news on Sunday during a visit to the Energy Industries Engineering and Design (EIED) Company, adding that "There are massive potentialities for expanding Iran-Iraq cooperation in oil, gas, refining and petrochemicals grounds, and Iran is ready to offer its capabilities to the Iraqi oil sector.”

He added that during the visit to EIED, which is affiliated to the Oil Industries' Engineering and Construction (OIEC), Iraqi Oil Minister Thamir Ghadhban learned about the capacities of the company, and it was decided that a joint partnership be established between OIEC and a similar company in Iraq in order to develop joint capacity utilization.

Zanganeh further pointed to Iran’s vast potentials in the oil, gas, refining and petrochemicals sectors, adding that "given the lack of development in the petrochemicals and gas industries in Iraq, there is a bright perspective for cooperation between the two countries."

The veteran minister noted that based on the talks between the two sides, Iranian firms can take part in the oil projects implemented in Iraq.

Noting that Iran’s gas dues from Iraq stand at $1 billion, Zanganeh said the Central Bank of Iran has been tasked to follow the process of receiving the money from the neighboring country.

Early in February, it was announced that Iran and Iraq share an estimated reservoir of 4 billion barrels of oil in Azar Oilfield, and Iran has recently completed the drilling operation for 7 wells in the field to tap into the shared natural resource.

The National Iranian Drilling Company (NIDC) completed the operations to drill 7 wells in Azar Oilfield in Anaran block, in the western province of lIam, according to supervisor of the project Hossein Rahimi.

Rahimi added that the operations were carried out in line with the government's push to speed up production from the field, which is shared with its western Arab neighbor, Iraq.

The official added that each well has been drilled within an average of 470 days by domestic experts.

The field is considered as one of the most difficult reservoirs to drill due to the sequence of its low- and high-pressure layers and the large number of tubes for drilling and lining of wells.

Azar holds 2.5 billion barrels of in-place oil, but new reservoir studies on the field suggest a much higher figure of 4 billion barrels. It is one of the six joint fields with Iraq, along with Dehloran, West Paydar, Naft-Shahr, Azadegan and Yadavaran.