The Iranian President, Hassan Rouhani, declared that the country plans to raise its gas exports to 200mcm/d, stressing that exports through pipelines to nearby countries and the achievement of liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects are prioritized, according to Tehran Times.

The country’s annual gas exports volume is projected to hit 68bcm/d in the next five years through transferring gas to neighboring countries. In line with this strategy, Tehran has so far initialed contracts with Turkey, Iraq, Pakistan, and Oman to export a total of 46bcm/year of gas, however, exports are currently sent only to Turkey.

In addition, there are plans to boost the capacity of Iranian gas refineries to 1bcm/d by 2017, Natural Gas Europe reported.

Iranian Oil Minister, Bijan Zanganeh, discussed the descending trend in the use of LNG as fuel in local power plants. While LNG constituted 18% of fuel used for power plants in total in 2016, the amount will be reduced to less than 10% by late 2017.

In related news, the minister added that the country’s South Pars gas field production has been steadily increasing since 2005/2006 with a total volume of 41bcm to 95bcm in 2013/14 and 130bcm in 2015/16. The phases 12, 15, 16, and 17 of the South Pars gas field have added 160mcm to the country’s refined gas production capacity and 140mcm to the dry gas production capacity. The production from the field is predicted to increase to 236bcm by early 2018.