Malaysian state oil company Petronas is "very happy" with its investments in Iran and is looking for more deals in the country's upstream sector despite the geopolitical risks, its chief executive said today.
Hassan Marican said the company had no intent of selling down its 10% stake in the multi-billion-dollar Pars liquefied natural gas project led by French giant Total.
Total and Petronas will make a final investment decision on the project this year, he said.
"We're very happy. We're there in Iran and we've been there since 1994," Hassan said in an interview with Reuters ahead of the Asia Oil and Gas Conference (AOGC) in Kuala Lumpur next week.
Echoing Total officials, Marican vowed to forge ahead despite US pressure on its allies not to invest in Iran, which the US and Europe fear is pursuing a nuclear programme to build atomic bombs. Tehran says it needs nuclear energy for power.
Although Petronas halved its stake in the project to 10% two years ago, it has no intention of selling down further, Hassan said. Total holds 40% and the National Iranian Oil Company holds the other half.
"Iran is one of the focus countries that we've identified and we continue to evaluate opportunities in the upstream sector in particular," he said.
Petronas partnered with European major Total and Russian giant Gazprom in the $2 billion development of Iran's South Pars phases 2 & 3, the first of 14 developments planned for the world's biggest natural gas field.
Pars LNG, which is expected to have two liquefaction trains, each with a annual capacity of 5 million tonnes fed by the South Pars gas field, has sealed one 3 million tonnes per annum sales contract with a Thai energy company and another deal with PetroChina.
Total and Petronas also each agreed in 2005 to lift 3 million tpa, the Pars LNG website shows.
Marican also said Petronas would consider listing some of its subsidiaries, but not the company itself.
"We have four subsidiaries on the exchange, including MISC and the property company, that's always been our strategy and we will continue to look at listing some others as and when they're ready," he said, adding that the company was not currently looking at any particular candidate.
Petronas units listed on the Malaysian stock exchange are MISC, the world's largest LNG shipper, gas distributor Petronas Gas, petroleum retailer Petronas Dagangan and property investor KLCC Property Holdings.
The company had no plans to issue debt this year, he added.
Petronas does not plan to build new domestic LNG plants but will focus on refurbishing its plants at Bintulu, in Malaysia's eastern state of Sarawak on Borneo island, the world's largest single LNG production facility.
Petronas owns three LNG plants in Bintulu, which can generate up to 23 million tonnes of LNG per year.
"The second plant is being debottlenecked, it will be ready by 2009," Hassan said.
"We still have not considered debottlenecking the third plant yet. So Bintulu, which is today 23 million tonnes, could easily go up to 26 million when all these things are done, when the third one is done."
© Upstream 2007
