The head of the company in charge of executing development of phases 9 and 10 of South Pars gas field development declared: Inaugurating the fourth and the last train of refineries, these two phases are to operate at nominal capacity in near future.

According to PIN, Morteza Emami told reporters that 3 out of 4 trains have been operated and put into use completely.

Mr Emami pointed out right now more than 40mm cm of natural gas are received from phases 6,7 and 8 of the South Pars gas field as feedstock and after purifying, it will be injected into the nationsl grid. Putting the refinery into full operation was of great concern in winter and at the moment the most important parts are prepared to use.

He added: Stabilizing units of gas condensates have been operated already, and sulphure unit of phase 9, purification of LPG, LPG storages and ethane purification unit are ready to be operated on the refinery’s onshore part.

“Two platforms in the sea have been installed and phase 9 platform is at full operation now. The 10th phase platform will be put into operation in a month.”

Falling by USD 0.46 Thursday, the basket price for oil produced by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) continued to soar above $40, the oil-cartel announced Friday.

One barrel (159 liters) of OPEC-produced crude stood at $40.85 Thursday.

In its latest outlook report, OPEC said global oil demand would fall by 180,000 barrels per day in 2009. That is an additional decrease of 30,000 barrels per day, compared with the previous forecast in last December.

Production projections were also lowered. The report said output from non-OPEC producers would grow by 580,000 barrels per day in 2009, down 70,000 barrels per day from the last forecast.

OPEC produces around 36 percent of the world"s oil supplies.

Processing with South Parse gas field development project, the last platform of Phase 8th (SPD8) will be loaded at the end of this week.

Enjoying desirable climatic conditions the platform installation takes 20 days normally, Mr. Karim Hassan zadeh, the manager of marine section of South Pars phases 6, 7 and 8 told PIN.

He continued: “Loading process will be carried upon SLB124 barge (a special type of carrier). This would carry the aforementioned platform to its installation location on its base.”

Mr. Hassan zaded added: Moving the platform alongside its jackets, HLB500Hk barge will be used to do installation process.

The manager of marine section of South Pars phases 6, 7and 8 of Petropars Company continued Most of the platforms have been installed in Persian Gulf and 10 wells have been dug.

Anchor casting process has been started yesterday and will take three days. Enjoying desirable climatic conditions loading process of platform (SPD8) is to complete on January 29, 2009. Otherwise it would be completed on January 30th.

He continued installation of platform takes 20 days normally and then the platform could transfer natural gas to the beach in 45 days.

He declared: Right now phases 6 and 7 of South Pars produce 1550bn cf natural gas a day and send 200m cf to sweeten to refinery of the phase 1 of the South Pars gas field-Phase one.

Designing and constructing of the platforms of South Pars phases 6, 7and 8 have been done in Sadra Company’s ship yard.

The obtained natural gas was to be injected to Aghajari oil field but in winter time it is to be used in refineries of phases 9 and 10 of the South Pars Natural gas field to compensate for any shortage in winter.

The first phase was the project was inaugurated by the President Ahmadinejad on 21st of October 2008.

Completing the project phases 6, 7 and 8 of South Pars Natural Gas field would produce 104mcm3 natural gas, 4700t of Butane and Propane (LPG) and 158000 barrel of gas condensates.

Injecting to Aghajari oil field, the sore gas produced in these three is transferred through a 56inch pipe. The pipeline length is 504km.