Iran has discovered a new onshore gas field in the southern province of Fars holding 7.5 trillion cubic feet (212bn cubic metres) of natural gas in place, Oil Minister Mohsen Paknejad said, as reported by IRIBNEWS on August 23.

Paknejad said about 5.7 trillion cubic feet (161 bcm) of the gas in the Takhteh field, located in the south of Fars, was recoverable.

“The recoverable gas from this field is equivalent to the volume of gas that can be extracted from one phase of the South Pars field for about 15 years,” Paknejad said.

South Pars, the world’s largest gas field, is shared by Iran and Qatar in the Persian Gulf and supplies nearly 70% of the country’s gas needs. Iran is developing its side in 24 phases

Paknejad described the gas in the newly discovered field as “sweet”, a quality that he said could reduce development costs because it contains little or none of the sulphur compounds found in sour gas.

“The field also holds significant volumes of condensate,” Paknejad said, adding that the combined value of the gas and condensate could create “tens of billions of dollars” in new wealth for Iran.

He called for the field to be developed “as soon as possible” to supply energy-intensive industries and other parts of Iran’s economy.

The discovery comes after Paknejad announced in October the discovery of large reserves at the Pazan field, also in the south of Fars province. Like the newly discovered field, Pazan contains sweet gas.

At the time, Paknejad said Pazan had an estimated 10 trillion cubic feet (283 bcm) of gas in place, of which about 7 trillion cubic feet (198 bcm) was recoverable.

The head of exploration at the National Iranian Oil Co. (NIOC) described Pazan as Iran’s largest independent onshore gas field.

Iran holds some of the world’s largest hydrocarbon reserves. OPEC figures put its proven crude oil reserves at 208.6bn barrels, the world’s third-largest after Venezuela and Saudi Arabia.

Its proven natural gas reserves stand at 33.987 trillion cubic metres, second only to Russia, according to OPEC data.