France's Total is on the verge of making a big investment in Iran's petrochemical sector, following on from the multi-billion dollar gas deal announced earlier this week, Iranian media reported Thursday.
"At the moment, we are negotiating to finalize a memorandum of understanding for it and we will not announce it until it is finalized," oil minister Bijan Zanganeh was quoted as saying by Jahan Eghtesad newspaper.
The project involves a full ethylene production cycle, he said.
National Petrochemical Company managing director Marzieh Shahdaei was quoted as saying by oil ministry news service Shana that the ethylene plant would have production capacity of around 2.2 million mt/year.
"It is predicted that once the agreement is made, Total will make between $1.5 billion-$2 billion in investment in Iran's petrochemical industry," Shahdaei said.
"At the moment, the talks are over two plants consisting of polyethylene and polymer, each with an annual capacity of 500,000 mt. Besides, the ethane cracker unit will have a 1 million-1.2 million mt/year production capacity," she explained.
On Monday, Total signed a $4.8 billion contract with Iran to develop phase 11 of the country's offshore South Pars gas field.
The deal was the first big foreign investment in Iran's energy sector in years, following the lifting of international sanctions related to Tehran's disputed nuclear program in January 2016.
In the signing ceremony, Total CEO Patrick Pouyanne said that his company planned to be more involved in Iran.
