Monday, 10 December 2007

Iran and China sign a giant oil contract

Iran and the Chinese Sinopec signed Sunday a contract of about two billion dollars for the development of the oil field Iranian Yadavaran which is located in the southwestern part of the country.

The field of Yadavaran, including the amount of oil recoverable is 3.2 billion barrels, had been the subject of a memorandum of understanding with Sinopec in October 2004, remained unanswered.

Besides its commercial aspect, the contract represents a political victory for Iran face of American pressure to dissuade the big foreign companies to invest in the Islamic Republic.

No oil company of international scope had signed the final contract for investment in Iran for several years.

China has become a leading trading partner of Iran in recent years, and ignored appeals and issued also reservations about the usefulness of aggravating UN sanctions against Tehran to force him to suspend his program nuclear.

The Chinese should see their investment completely paid off after four years, not eight as provided in the Memorandum of Understanding of 2004.

The field contains, in addition to crude oil, 76 billion m3 of gas associates and 397 million barrels of recoverable condensate.

A first phase of development of the field will achieve an output of 85,000 barrels per day after four years, before a second phase of a planned duration of 36 months, brings the total output to 185,000 barrels per day.