Austria’s OMV is reportedly negotiating with the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) over the development of Iran’s Cheshmeh Khosh oil field.
Fars news agency reported that a delegation from OMV had met Amir-Hossein Zamaniniya, Iran’s deputy petroleum minister for international affairs, as well as Salbali Karimi, the managing director of the Iranian Central Oil Fields Company (ICOFCO.), to discuss the project.
Fars added that talks had already involved the technical points.
The field is located in Iran’s western province of Ilam. It is expected to have a production of 18,000 barrels per day of oil and 115 million cubic feet of natural gas once fully developed.
OMV had in several earlier reports been quoted by Iran’s media to be considering the development of Cheshmeh Khosh.
The company withdrew from the same field in 2008 after a series of draconian US-engineered sanctions were imposed on Iran.
OMV had already said that it saw its future in Iran and Russia.
“With our new strategy, we will focus on cash and costs, pursue a sustainable position in upstream focusing on value over volume growth,” OMV Chief Executive Rainer Seele had been quoted by the media as saying in February 2016. “The main development regions are Russia, the United Arab Emirates and Iran.”
Apart from Cheshmeh Khosh, OMV was involved in the exploration of Mehr block where it eventually discovered oil – but the volume was not commercial enough for the NIOC to approve its development.
OMV was previously also pursuing exports of natural gas from Iran to Europe – a project which was known as Nabucco. It was abandoned as complications – most importantly the sanctions against Iran - grew later.
