Iranian oil industry to carry out projects

Iranian Deputy Oil Minister for Research and Technology Mohammad Reza Moqqadam told Shana that 380 research projects will be implemented by the oil industry over the fifth five year development plan period up to 2015 that will cut Iran's oil industry reliance on abroad considerably. Moqqadam said the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) will assume 69 projects which include subjects as enhancing recovery rate, modeling, control and management of reservoirs, production and exploitation, exploration, promotion and technology in drilling operations, establishment of an integrated data bank, industrial protection and environment, optimizing energy consumption, materials and equipments manufacturing, strategic and infrastructure studies, productivity and specialized maintenance. He continued that the National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC) also will take responsibility of working on 33 subjects adding the main subjects include gas processing, separation of containing value-added products (management of sulfur), optimizing refining processes, development of technology and upgrading domestically manufacturing, corrosion and industrial protection in natural gas refining process, understanding and promoting capabilities in transferring and distribution of natural gas. The official remarked that the refining sector also will take the responsibility of 20 research projects that in turn will reduce refining sector's dependence on foreigners to less than 30 percent. "Achieving gas conversion know-how and its related catalysts (converting gas to methanol, aromatics and ammoniac), converting methanol to propylene, gasoline, Dimethyl ether and olefins, getting access to other catalysts know-how and non-polymer processes including dehydrogenation are among the main projects would be implemented by petrochemical sector," the official said. Moqqadam concluded that the National Iranian Oil Refining and Distribution Company (NIORDC) will also carry out a number of research projects mainly on hydro conversion (conversion of ultra heavy oil to light oil), converting residue to middle distillates, removing sulfur from refining processes, risk management and controlling environmental risks and manufacturing alerting gas leakage devices and so on.