Iran to sign first contract to barter oil for power plant restoration

Iran is to sign a contract with a Japanese company for the restoration of a power plant which will be financed through a barter mechanism involving Iran’s oil.

An official from Iran’s Energy Ministry said that the contract would see Iran barter its oil for “execution” of a restoration project in the Rey Power Plant, an old facility near the capital Tehran which needs renovation, reported Press TV.

Thermal Power Plants Holding Company (TPPH) of Iran CEO Mohsen Tarztalab said the contract would be worth €500 million and signed in the upcoming days.

“Next week a contract will be signed for funding the restoration of the Rey Power Plant through barter of oil for execution,” said Tarztalab, adding that mechanism has been allowed under a sub-article of an annual draft budget passed by the Iranian Parliament last year.

The oil barter contract would be a first for Iran, a country hit by US sanctions, which restrict its ability to both sell oil and receive its revenues in foreign currencies.

The sanctions began last year when Washington unilaterally withdrew from a 2015 international deal on Iran’s nuclear program.

Iran has rejected US claims that sanctions would reduce Iran’s oil exports to zero, saying Tehran would exhaust any possible channel to sell its oil to traditional customers.

The barter contract will come more than a month after Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, whose country has been a main buyer of Iran’s oil for the past decades, traveled to Tehran for a first visit by a Japanese head of state since Iran's Islamic Revolution in 1979.

source: Iran Daily