The Iranian government approved the development of Yadavaran and Jofeir oilfields as buy-back schemes worth $4.071 billion by China's Sinopec and Belarusian Belarusneft in order to produce 110,000 barrels of oil per day.

The decision stipulates for the maximum utilization of the domestic expertise based on the Fourth Socio-Economic Development Plan (2005-2010), Mehr News Agency reported.

China's biggest refiner, Sinopec, and Iran signed a $2 billion agreement on developing the Yadavaran oil field in 2007.

The agreement completed a 2004 memorandum of understanding for the state-owned Sinopec Group to help develop the huge oilfield.

Sinopec Group, the state-owned parent of Sinopec Corp., agreed in October 2004 to take the lead in developing the Iranian oilfield and to buy 10 million metric tons of liquefied natural gas every year for 25 years in a deal worth as much as $100 billion.

The Yadavaran deal calls for the Chinese company to invest in developing the oilfield in two phases, with the first phase to produce 85,000 barrels per day to be carried out in four years. The second phase, to produce an additional 95,000 barrels per day, is to be completed in another three years.

Yadavaran oilfield in Khuzestan province is one of the largest untapped fields in the world and is expected to have a potential output of 300,000 barrels per day of crude oil. It has 3.2 billion barrels of recoverable reserves, with recoverable gas reserves estimated at 2.7 trillion cubic feet or 80 billion cubic meters.

The Yadavaran oilfield's early production started with a daily capacity of 20,000 barrels in July.
Jofeir oilfield is located in Iran-Iraq border and is expected to produce 30,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil and 6.3 million cubic feet of natural gas based on initial estimations.

National Iranian Oil Company and Belarus National Oil Company Belarusneft signed a contract for development of Jofeir oilfield in September 2007.

Belarus said the crude from Jofeir would either be refined in Iran or simply extracted by Belarus and sold on world markets. It would be the first energy project abroad for Belarus.

In May 2009, Belarus Deputy Prime Minister Vladimir Semashko met former Vice Governor of the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran Reza Raei. Following this meeting, the Central Bank of Iran announced it will lend $212 million to Belarus' state-run firm Belarusneft for the development of the Jofeir oil field.

© Iran Daily 2009