Iran to Install Persian Gulf's Largest Offshore Oil Platform

Operations to install the P4 platform, built by Iranian experts, in Irans offshore Persian Gulf Reshadat oil field, 110km south west of Lavan island, will start next week.

According to the Iranian news agency Shana, the Tasdid Marine Structures Development Co. built the 229-foot high, 3,100-ton structure, which will be installed in the Reshadat field, 68 miles southwest of Lavan Island.

According to Tasdid Marine Structures Development Co. managing director Amir Panahi, Once in operation, the platform will produce 75,000 barrels of oil daily. The P4 platform in the Reshadat oil has a weight of 3100 tons, which will increase to 4500 tons following the installation of stabilizing pillars. Panahi added that a structure weighing 9,000 tons would be installed on the platform.

Panahi added that Tasdid Marine Structures Development Co. engineers were responsible for all stages of design, purchase, construction, loading, transfer and installation of the platform and if the project had been subcontracted out to a foreign company it would have cost 1.5 to 2 times more.

The Reshadat oilfield P4 platform was ordered by the Falat Qarreh oil company.

National Iranian Oil Company Managing Director Ahmad Qalebani recently announced that Iran's oil exports have increased by 50,000 barrels per day since the beginning of the current Iranian calendar year , which began on 21 March, despite U.S.-led sanctions and noted that more than 60 percent of the necessary equipment for Irans oil industry is now produced domestically and that its share of oilfield equipment production will exceed 90 percent by 2014.

(Charles Kennedy is Deputy Editor of OilPrice.com. The original article appears http://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Iran-to-Install-Persian-Gulfs-Largest-Offshore-Oil-Platform.html.)

Charles Kennedy is a writer for OilPrice.com.