29-12-08 Iran has put into operation its sixth cross-country gas pipeline to transfer sweetened gas in phases 9 and 10 of the South Pars field.
"The 492-km transmission pipeline has the capacity to carry 110 mm cm of sweet gas per day," said Azizollah Ramezani, the managing director of National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC).

The pipeline will feed the southern Iranian provinces of Khuzestan and Bushehr; it also raises the prospect of Iran beginning gas exports to Kuwait. Iran has set ambitious objectives for its gas sector and has managed to raise its 2007 production to 169 bn cubic yards.
The country plans to increase its output to 617.5 bn cubic yards by 2020. The target if achieved would allow the country to become the third largest gas producer.

Oil Minister Gholamhossein Nozari said that phases 9 and 10 which are the largest national projects will join the country's gas network on the occasion of the Ten-Day-Dawn ceremonies marking the victory anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution (February 1-10). He praised great efforts made by all those involved in the country's oil industry development projects.
Nozari also met with Russian Energy Minister Sergei Shmatko and Gazprom chief Alexei Miller to discuss energy cooperation and the recently formalized Gas Exporting Countries Forum. Nozari described the meeting as positive, saying it was a significant sign of Russian leadership in the energy sector as the indoctrination of a formal GECF charter took place in Moscow, calling it a significant event.

The Iranian minister said he had extended a formal invitation to visit Tehran to his Russian partners in the energy sector. GECF members formalized the institution in Moscow to coordinate efforts among major natural gas producers. The GECF was envisaged in Tehran in 2001.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin told the delegation the area of cheap natural gas was over.

"Gas OPEC can affect future political developments in Iran's favour and increase its influence in the eastern half of Europe," Majlis Foreign Policy and National Security Committee member Eivaz Heidarpour said. "Since Iran proposed the formation of this organization, naturally it is deemed as one of the pillars of it," he told.
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei proposed the idea of setting up an organization of gas cooperation like OPEC in 2007.

Heidarpour also said the European countries are concerned about the emergence of the gas grouping as it will make the Muslim world, particularly the Middle East, more influential on the international stage.
"As economy plays a vital role in politics, the organization will give its member states more political clout and this will ease the pressure imposed on Iran by the Western powers," Heidarpour noted.

Iran has added energy to the quiver of its diplomatic and political arrows. Its advance to the global gas market could disrupt the current balance of interests forever.
If a marker is to be put down, the turning point came on March 17 when Iran and Switzerland signed a 25-year gas deal. According to the Swiss government, the deal between Elektrizitaetsgesellschaft Laufenburg and the National Iranian Gas Export Company is worth $ 42 bn. It is the first of its kind in the recent past in which a European energy company has actually signed a firm contract with Iran.

That the deal signified a watershed in the geopolitics of energy security was apparent from the presence of Mottaki and visiting Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey at the signing ceremony in Tehran. Indeed, Calmy-Rey acknowledged that Switzerland has a strategic interest to secure Iran's gas supplies and diversify its gas suppliers.
Looking ahead, a report noted, "Following the Swiss-Iranian deal, some European leaders have voiced concern about new investment in LNG, the sector in which groups such as Total, Royal Dutch Shell and Austria's OMV have struck preliminary agreements with Iran but have yet to sign formal contracts."

Iran's Swiss deal has alerted world capitals. Chinahas speeded up negotiations over its $ 16 bn gas deal over Iran's North Pars gas field. China's National Offshore Oil Corporation signed a memorandum in 2007 to expand the gas reserves of the North Pars field and also purchase LNG from the output for a 25-year period.
It will be China's second big energy deal, with the Chinese oil refinery Sinopec having signed in early March a $ 2 bn deal to develop Iran's Yadavaran oil field.

Iran has multiple choices from the East and West. Principal among them is Russia's Gazprom. To be sure, Moscow has speeded up its energy dialogue with Iran in recent weeks. On April 23, the Iranian government and Gazprom signed a memorandum of understanding to cooperate in the development of oil and gas fields, as well as investment and exploratory studies.
Gazprom's bid is to secure the rights to develop several sites at Iran's South Pars gas field in the Persian Gulf and the North Azadegan oil deposit in southern Iran. Gazprom is already participating in the development ofthe South Pars' second and third stages jointly with France's TotalFinaElf and Malaysia's Petronas.