State-owned Iranian Central Oil Fields Company (ICOFC) plans to drill 128 new wells over the next two years.

More than 13 fields in the south and west of Iran are to be developed, under ICOFC’s masterplan, presented to its parent company, National Iran Oil Company (NIOC).

ICOFC will use 29 drilling rigs to prepare wells for development and production at the fields in 2012. Tenders for production facilities and infrastructure work are expected to be released in the same year.

The scheme is expected to cost more than $1.2bn for oil field development, as well as $2.2bn in expanding gas production. Infrastructure in the operational regions will also require about $860m.

ICOFC plans to complete the installation of early oil production facilities at two fields in the Shiraz province of central Iran by March 2012 (MEED 8:6:11).

The onshore oil firm produces 157,000 barrels a day (b/d) of oil and 260 million cubic metres a day (cm/d) of natural gas from 24 fields. By 2015, ICOFC plans to increase this to 55 fields, producing as much as 372,000 b/d of crude oil, 130,000 b/d of condensates and 407 million cm/d of gas, says ICOFC’s managing director, Mahdi Fakour.