Iran pumps about 3.9 million barrels a day of crude.

Iran, the second largest-member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, is prepared to support an increase in oil output to ease prices if there is additional demand in the market, a top oil official told Dow Jones Tuesday.
“OPEC has not received any complaint that there’s not enough crude oil in the market,“ Javad Yarjani, the oil ministry’s head of the OPEC affairs department, said in a phone interview from Tehran.
“If there is a need for crude, OPEC is always ready to react and supply the market,“ he added.
Yarjani said current high prices were due to ’a problem in the downstream, some problem with the stock level of some refined products in some parts of the world’.
Crude oil inventories are ’very well on top of the five-year average’, making immediate OPEC action to increase output unnecessary, Yarjani said.
“I don’t think from now until September this picture will change. Then, when OPEC meets, all these things will be discussed,“ he said.
Iran pumps about 3.9 million barrels a day of crude.
IRNA earlier Tuesday quoted Yarjani as saying that present crude prices reflected a ’fair’ value.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday that oil falls on expectation of higher US fuel output and Iran plans.
’OPEC will inject more oil’ if the market requires it, said Yarjani according to IRNA. His remarks came two days after Mohamed Al-Hamli, the president of OPEC, said the group might increase output this year, because it’s concerned by near-record prices, Reuters reported.
OPEC pumps about 40 percent of the world’s oil. It cut production last year to quell rising stockpiles. The group will review its production ceiling at a meeting in Vienna on Sept. 11, just before the fourth quarter, when world demand peaks.
Crude oil fell for a third day in New York on signs US refiners are increasing fuel supplies, while Iran said OPEC will increase production, if necessary.

Iran and Germany have signed a memorandum of understanding to conduct feasibility studies on transrapid high-speed magnetic train link between Tehran and the northeastern city of Mashhad in Khorasan Razavi province, said a senior official with Roads and Transportation Ministry.
The MoU was signed between Iran’s Road Ministry and Germany’s Schlegel engineering firm to assess possibilities of developing the high-speed rail link to ferry up to 20 million pilgrims a year along a 900-km route between Tehran and Mashhad, Hamid Behbahani stated on Wednesday.
He was quoted by Fars as saying that the deal was reached between two sides during a recent visit by an Iranian expert delegation to Germany.
The official noted that members of the Iranian team have obtained useful information on the record-breaking train, which ’floats’ on a monorail as a result of a magnetic levitation (maglev) system after touring companies which supply technology for the Transrapid.
He elaborated that the entire project will be implemented in three phases; feasibility studies, phase one and two studies and finally construction of the route.
If the project goes ahead, Iran would become the second country after China, to have the high-speed train which can attain speeds of 500 km/h in the first three kilometers.
Behbahani predicted that feasibility studies will be over in 1.5 to two years while construction time is estimated between three and four years.
He expressed hope that feasibility studies to determine whether a Transrapid track can be built along the proposed route would begin in the first half of the year to March 2008 (March-September 2007).
Iran had earmarked $1.5 billion startup capital for the project and hoped to find co-investors.
The idea was first discussed three years ago during a visit to Tehran by Otto Wiesheu, the then Bavarian economics minister, who is currently on the board of Germany’s Deutsche Bahn rail network.

Close to eight kilometers of coastline on the Persian Gulf in Bandar Abbas have been heavily polluted due to oil spillage.
The environmental disaster occurred on July 15 after Bandar Abbas Power Plant released 100 tons of mazut into the Persian Gulf.
The spillage covers eight kilometers of the coastline in an area extending from the power plant to Shahid Bahonar Port.
A senior Department of Environment (DoE) official, Omid Seddiqi blamed the contractor of the power plant of negligence by causing the pollution.
He told ISNA that the polluted coastlines cannot easily be mopped up due to specific features of the beach.
The official noted that the region is home to precious marine flora and fauna including oysters and shrimps.
An area with eight-km length and 100-meter width was polluted by the power plant, located 15 km west of the capital city of southern Hormuzgan province.
Seddiqi regretted that one million tons of oil are annually discharged into the Persian Gulf.
Meanwhile, deputy DoE chief, Mohammad Baqer Nabavi said that the department lodged a complaint with legal authorities, adding that the case is being followed up.
He noted that the department will dispatch experts from Tehran to Bandar Abbas to conduct comprehensive surveys.
The official stated that the losses have not yet been assessed.

The total cost has been estimated at 770 million euros for constructing the SubwayÕs Line 3 which is to include 23 underground stations over a distance of about 24 kilometers.

Head of Tehran’s Subway Company Mohsen Hashemi and managing director of Bank of Industry and Mine Mehdi Razavi signed a contract on Wednesday to provide $100 million to start the executive operation of Tehran Subway’s Line Three.
As per authorization of Economic Council and following the cabinet’s provincial approval in the year to March 2006, the credit has been allocated to the company in form of finance. Tehran Municipality has approved to repay 50 percent of the amount, while the other 50 is to be paid back by the government, IRIBnews reported.
The total cost has been estimated at 770 million euros for constructing the Subway’s Line 3 which is to include 23 underground stations over a distance of about 24 kilometers, and seven ground-level stations over a length of 11 kilometers. The project is to be completed in five phases by 2014.
Executive work on the first phase extending over seven kilometers and involving 1,100 meters of tunnel will start in late summer and go on stream in 2009.
Tehran Subway’s Line Three starts from southernmost part in Islamshahr and after passing through Chahardangeh, Rah-Ahan, Monirieh and Vali-e Asr squares, will reach Shahid Beheshti Street and then cross Resalat, Majidieh streets and Imam Ali-Shahid Zeinuddin Intersection and end in Lashgarak. About one million urban trips are to be conducted through this line.

A nuclear plant Russia is building for Iran in southern Bushehr city will not be completed before autumn 2008 at the earliest, Russian news agencies quoted one of the companies building the plant as saying Wednesday.
“The real date for the physical launch of the power plant is being delayed until autumn 2008,“ RIA Novosti quoted Ivan Istomin, director of nuclear builder Energoprogress as saying.
Istomin rejected reports by Iranian officials that the plant could be operational this year, AFP reported.
On Monday, head of power plant’s workshop, Mahmoud Jafari announced that the power plant will become operational by September 2007.
“It can be said quite precisely that putting the Bushehr plant into operation this autumn is unrealistic,“ he said.
“Even if Russia delivered the first shipment of nuclear fuel to Bushehr tomorrow (Thursday), it would be impossible to launch the station within six months.“
Bushehr power plantÑIran’s first nuclear power plant was scheduled to start in September, 2006, but the $1 billion project has been hit with repeated delays.
Comments from Energoprogress, one of the subcontractors working on the plant, are the latest indication that Moscow may be slowing work on the project.
Construction stalled earlier this year over charges that Iran had fallen behind on payments and over delays in shipping parts for the plant from third countries.
A pair of Iranian nuclear negotiators flew to Moscow on Tuesday to attempt to persuade Russia to complete the plant.

Iran’s gas exports to Turkey reached over 20 billion cubic meters (cu.m.) until June 21. Tehran and Ankara signed a contract on Dec. 10, 2001 to transfer Iran’s natural gas to Turkey.
Iran exported 20.7 billion cubic meters of the natural gas to Turkey during Dec. 20, 2001-June 21, 2007, IPI reported on Wednesday.
Turkey imported 18.8 billion cu.m. of natural gas until March 20, 2007. In other words, Turkey’s gas imports from Iran stood at 1.8 billion cu.m. during the first quarter of the year to March 2008.
This shows a 100-million-cu.m. rise compared to the figures for the same period last year.
It is projected that the country will transfer nine billion cu.m. of natural gas to Turkey in the year to March 2008.
Based on plans, 2.3 billion cu.m. of natural gas were to be exported during March-June this year.
According to Public Relations Office of the National Iranian Gas Company, some 80 percent of the projected exports have been achieved during the three-month period.
Meanwhile, Iran imported over 42 billion cu.m. of gas from Turkmenistan during Dec. 20, 2001-June 21, 2007.
It is planned the country will import eight billion cu.m. of natural gas from the Central Asian state in the year to March 2008.
Iran and Turkey reached a memorandum of understanding on exporting Iranian and Turkmen gas to Europe via Iran and Turkey. Under the agreement, Iran and Turkmenistan will pump 30 billion cu.m. of gas a year to Europe via Turkey.
Turkey and Iran have also agreed that the Turkish Petroleum Corporation (TPAO) will produce 20 billion cu.m. natural gas in the three phases of Iran’s South Pars gas field. This agreement would help Iran open a new export market for its huge reserves. Iran, which has the world’s biggest gas reserves after Russia, has been considering Ukraine and Turkey as possible export routes to Europe.