NIOC’s International R&D Interactions

In contemporary world, technology applied to oil and gas industry has been growing in accordance with increasing consumption of hydrocarbon resources. Today, knowledge of state-of-the-art technologies applied to petroleum industry is as important as the volume of hydrocarbon reserves. In addition to protecting God-given oil and gas resources, technology has managed to effectively reduce production and refining costs and increase willingness for investment in oil and natural gas exploration and production in remote areas. Iran already sits atop 159 billion barrels of crude oil and 34 tcm of natural gas. Therefore, it has to meet its growing need for cutting edge technology required for oil extraction.

Ebrahim Alavi Taleqani, director of R&D at National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC), said research was an important pillar which would guarantee progress and sustainable development in every country.

“Continuation of extraction, exploration, production, transfer and processing petroleum products, which is envisaged in the country’s vision plan in a bid to win a toehold in regional and global markets and also safeguard Islamic Republic of Iran’s petroleum industry in the unequal battlefield of international competition, requires formulating basic plans, attraction of necessary investment for maintenance, updating and developing knowhow for our country’s petroleum industry,” he said.

Alavi Taleqani said the most important factor in achieving success would be to precisely formulate and design plans and strategies in harmony with objectives.

“The NIOC Directorate of Research and Technology is seeking to turn this company from an operation-based to a knowledge-based one in line with development of technology so that it would regulate its activities and objectives on this basis. In the meantime, by elucidating 11 technology sectors NIOC seeks to realize the lofty objectives of the Islamic establishment for upgrading the level of technology and provide the necessary infrastructure for reasonable enhancement in oil and gas production,” he said.

To that end, the NIOC Directorate of Research and Technology has since 2000 been pursuing activities and research projects related to upstream oil industry.

Formulating and working research and technology strategies at NIOC, institutionalizing and promoting research activities, preparing the ground for growth, creativity and innovation in the petroleum industry, designing study plans, guidance and supervision on upstream research projects, benefiting from universities, research centers, knowledge-based companies and technology parks are among research missions defined for the Directorate.

Alavi Taleqani said formulating a technology and research roadmap, examining and approving executive plans for research and technology projects, estimates on financial and human resources and their allocation, development and indigenization of key technologies, transfer of technical savvy in development projects, supporting commercialization, entrepreneurship, marketing, planning and designing mechanisms needed for scientific and technological networks are among tasks assigned to the Directorate.

R&D sections of NIOC offshoots, professional research centers (Research Institute of Petroleum Industry, Petroleum University of Technology and Research Center for Enhanced Oil and Gas Recovery), centers of excellence (universities, research centers, companies and professional academic teams), and international centers (oil companies, consulting companies and foreign universities) are among executive pillars of the NIOC Directorate of Research and Technology.

“The Directorate of Research and Technology is making efforts to change NIOC from an operation-based company to a technology-based one in a bid to pave the ground for the acquisition and development of technologies applying to exploration, enhanced recovery, wells’ technology, production, oil and gas processing, environment and safety, efficient use of energy, etc. at the level of NIOC and its offshoots,” said Alavi Taleqani.

The projects under way by the NIOC Directorate of Research and Technology are as follows: research projects with focus on the manufacturing of equipment and commodities, strategic studies, infrastructure and productivity, industrial and environmental protection, technological upgrade in drilling operations and services, integrated databank, and enhanced oil recovery.

Furthermore, the NIOC Directorate of Research and Technology, Pars Oil and Gas Company (POGC), Arvandan Oil and Gas Production Company (AOGPC), Iranian Central Oil Fields Company (ICOFC), Iranian Offshore Oil Company (IOOC), Khazar Exploration and Production Company (KEPCO), Oil Engineering and Development Company (OEDC), National Iranian Drilling Company (NIDC), Iranian Oil Terminals Company (IOTC), Iran Fuel Conservation Company (IFCO), Pars Special Economic Energy Zone (PSEEZ) and National Iranian South Oil Company (NISOC) have a variety of research projects focused upon the aforesaid fields under way.

In order to realize the technological objectives of NIOC, the Research Institute of Petroleum Industry (RIPI) as a professional research center signed last year a memorandum of cooperation with a French company in order to acquire new experiences.

Noting that the NIOC is ready for any kind of cooperation to expand international cooperation, Alavi Taleqani said: “International technological cooperation and experience achieved from such joint cooperation could be a step towards upgrading technical knowhow.”

He said commercialization of research projects was one of important plans of the Directorate, noting that “it is necessary for us to move towards generation of wealth through knowledge and technology.”

“Research will prove effective once it becomes practical because merely writing an article or a book and ignoring the practicability of research will not be effective,” he added.

Taking into consideration the condition of transfer of technology in the contracts and paying due attention to it for upgrading the level of technology has been a major objective pursued by those who developed the Iran Petroleum Contract (IPC) as a new model for oil contracts. Under IPC, foreign companies are required to help provide Iran with technological savvy pertaining to petroleum industry in addition to creation of value through development of oil and gas fields.

Alavi Taleqani said RIPI and the NIOC Directorate of Research and Technology have been conducting research on the “role of transfer of technology in new oil contracts”.

“This important move has been evaluated from the standpoint of economic resilience. Based on research conducted in this regard, it was suggested that appropriate criteria be designed to measure the transfer of technology in a bid to assess the computability of technology with upstream contracts on exploration, development and production. The NIOC contract technology working group is tasked with designing these criteria and subsequently supervising the transfer and development of relevant technologies.”

Alavi Taleqani said: “The most important event which we have witnessed over recent years at the NIOC research and technology has been the shift in paradigms. We have switched from ‘research for research’ to ‘practical research’.”

He also highlighted the new approach pursued by the Ministry of Petroleum regarding manufacturing of commodities and items needed by the petroleum industry.

“The ten groups of domestic manufacturers of petroleum industry commodities that have signed contracts with the Ministry of Petroleum are required to provide their capacities in manufacturing and also present a roadmap for their own technological upgrade. The NIOC Directorate of Research and Technology is tasked with assessing the technological maturity of manufacturers and watching their compliance with their roadmap,” he said.

In a bid to implement the general policies of the 6th Five-Year Economic Development Plan regarding a continued increase in the rate of recovery from oil and gas reservoirs and meeting a one-percent target in recovery enhancement and also in order to implement the major policies of resilient economy in the upstream oil sector, NIOC envisages a project on the transfer and development of technology in the upstream sector, which includes enhanced oil recovery plus improved oil recovery (EOR/IOR) in 20 oil and gas fields (52 reservoirs) in cooperation with nine universities and research centers with the objective of paving the ground for the development of basic technological savvy.

These universities are required to fully study a reservoir and account for devising a roadmap and launching an EOR center, enhancing the rate of recovery on the long term, improving production operations and reducing its costs, transferring technical and technological knowhow via research and technology projects, reducing risks through application of modern technologies, training manpower specializing in reservoir management, preparing the ground for communications between industry and university, establishing consortiums of EOR/IOR technology comprising research advisors, foreign partners and knowledge-based companies and contractors at regional and international levels.

In order to orientate and arrange its activities to change the NIOC from an operation-based company into a knowledge-based one, the Directorate of Research and Technology envisages assigning purchase of equipment and products to knowledge-based companies for a limited period of time.

“The NIOC has signed agreements with the “Office of Vice President for Science and Technology” and the “Modern Technologies Development Fund” in order to commercialize research activities,” said Alavi Taleqani.

The activities carried out since the signature of agreement include numerous technical and specialized working groups’ meetings in the presence of experts and specialists to adopt instructions and assessment indicators, set up databank for the proposed projects of subsidiary companies, and determine priorities for the acquisition of technologies needed in the upstream oil sector.

According to Alavi Taleqani, after the removal of obstacles to the financing of contracts for the commercialization of technological achievements, the NIOC Directorate of Research and Technology will issue instructions for knowledge-based companies to start work.

Alavi Taleqani said the Directorate of Research and Technology has been supervising the performance of 208 research projects based on defined priorities. Of these projects, which are being conducted under contracts with universities, research centers, knowledge-based companies and parks of science and technology, 127 have been completed and the rest is still under way.