Iran will be able to produce more than 1 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas per day once the final platform is installed at the South Pars offshore field, its oil minister was quoted as saying on Monday by the official IRIB news agency.
South Pars, which Qatar calls North Field, is the world's largest gas field and is shared between Iran and Qatar.
"Of the two last platforms at South Pars, one was installed today and the next platform will be installed before (March 20)," Iran's Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh said.
"And so we will have all the platforms of the 27 phases of South Pars, which will enable us to produce more than 1 billion cubic meters of gas per day."
Separately, Zanganeh said that coronavirus is to blame for price fluctuations in the oil market, according to SHANA, the news site of the Iranian oil ministry.
Twelve people have died and 61 have been infected with the virus in Iran, Tehran's health ministry said on Monday.
Several countries in the region have closed their borders with Iran and imposed air travel restrictions after people infected with coronavirus arrived from the Islamic Republic.
Despite the air travel restrictions, Zanganeh said that he would attend a meeting of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in Vienna next week using Iran Air, SHANA reported.
(Reporting by Babak Dehghanpisheh; Editing by David Goodman and Jan Harvey)
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