Indian oil companies that are dragging their feet about investing in the South Pars gasfield.
Petropars, the Iranian state-owned oil firm that is managing the development of Phase 12 of South Pars, has given the Indians until December 31 to come up with the funds to develop Phase 12.
A Petropars official told Indian reporters last week that Petropars had given the Indian firms the deadline to put up or shut up at the beginning of October.
Petropars signed a 40 percent share in the project over to ONGC Videsh Ltd. and the Hinduja Group.
Asked if the delay might be related to sanctions on Iran, Gholam-Reza Manouchehri, the chief of Petropars, said, “For sure, it is not technical.”
Manouchehri said, “The technical due diligence has been completed by ONGC. The financial and project model have been gone through. We have given ONGC a three-month deadline to respond. One month has already passed.… We are hopeful that they will join the project.… We are waiting for the ONGC decision.”
Iran tried the same deadline threats with Royal Dutch Shell and Repsol of Spain when they were dragging their feet on investing in South Pars Phases 13 and 14.
But Iran kept renewing and extending the deadlines so they became rather hollow. And ONGC knows that history.
