When Bijan Zanganeh was appointed as Iran’s petroleum minister in 2013 he didn’t need much time to get back up to speed. Many of the key projects stemmed from his first tenure as minister which had ended back in 2005. He swiftly laid down the law, stating that the National Petrochemical Company (NPC) should focus on the raft of unfinished projects rather than launching new ones (MEES, 6 September 2013).
That approach has paid dividends. Even under tough US sanctions, Iran was able to bring online some 14mn t/y petchems capacity since March 2020 to reach nearly 80mn t/y, with a target of 100mn t/y by 2022 (MEES, 4 December 2020). However, this expansion has increased Iran’s demand for gas feedstock (MEES, 10 October 2014). (CONTINUED - 775 WORDS)
