TEHRAN: Iran has prepared its biggest oil export terminal on the Kharg Island for stepped-up shipments of crude in time for the lifting of sanctions, an official says.
The “strategic plan” for year-long repair and overhaul of undersea oil pipelines and other marine salvage operations on the island is complete before schedule, head of the Kharg Oil Termanil Abbas Asad-Rouz said on Wednesday.
Repair work was carried out on two subsea pipelines which had been damaged during Iraq’s bombing of the facilities on the island during the 1980-1988 war of the former dictator Saddam Hussein on Iran.
Oil from Iran’s fields reaches the island through four 72- and 60-inch pipelines –32 kilometers in length on the seabed. The oil is then stored in tanks for transfer to export jetties on the island and loading.
There is a storage capacity for 30 million barrels of oil on the Kharg Island, giving it more flexibility for exports, according to some reports. The island lies near the Strait of Hormuz where a fifth of global oil exports passes.
This undated photo shows Singapore-registered KHK Vision docked for crude loading at the Kharg terminal.
Iran has prepared its oil terminals for 6 million barrels per day (bpd) of exports when the sanctions are lifted, Managing Director of the Iranian Oil Terminals Company Pirouz Mousavi has said.
Currently, the country exports a little more than 1 million bpd of crude. Officials say exports will rise by another 1 million bpd within six months after the removal of the sanctions.
Iran plans a new oil terminal outside the Strait of Hormuz to provide backup option for exports. The new terminal at Bandar Jask on the Gulf of Oman coast of Iran will be connected to the port of Neka to transfer 1 million bpd of Caspian oil.
Neka has an import capacity for crude swaps with the Caspian states of Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Russia.
Mousavi has said the planned terminal would have a storage capacity of 20 million barrels and cost around $2.2 billion to build.
