The new pipeline will also increase the country’s capacity for oil swap from the current figure of 150,000 to one million brl/d.
Mr Nozari said Iran is already involved in oil swap with the Caspian Sea republics, but construction of the pipeline would make it possible for these landlocked countries to transfer their oil at lower costs to international markets. The oil swap plan allows those Central Asian republics with access to the Caspian Sea – or those in the Caucasus which have agreed on an oil swap with Iran – to transfer their oil to Neka from where it would be pumped to a refinery in the NW Iranian city of Tabriz, or to a refinery south of the capital Tehran. Iran will then supply swappers’ customers with crude of comparable quality at an oil terminal in the Persian Gulf. So far Kazakh and Turkmen producers have been the main swappers, followed Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia.
Speaking at a meeting to inaugurate the plan to increase the capacity of the Bandar Abbas-Isfahan pipeline, Mr Nozari said that the Neka-Jask pipeline will also allow the littoral countries of Caspian Sea to export their oil at a lower cost. The pipeline will run across Iran from the city of Neka, in the Caspian Sea province of Mazandaran, to the Gulf of Oman port city of Jask in Hormuzgan province.
Asked about the plan to increase the capacity of the Bandar Abbas-Isfahan pipeline, he noted that the plan will change the transfer system of oil and oil products from trucks to pipeline, in a move seen as both less costly and safer. He said the Bandar Imam Petrochemical Complex is a major hub for petrochemical industries, while Assaluyeh is the hub of the gas industry. According to current plans, the Bandar Abbas refinery, which is capable of treating about 1m brl/d of crude oil, will become a hub for the oil refining industry. He went on to add that the negotiations on the Peace Pipeline are continuing in a satisfactory manner and that the project will certainly be carried out.