Persistent shortages in Iranian gas supplies to Iraq have depressed the Arab country’s power production by nearly 7,600 MW, according to officials.

The decline comes as Iraq struggles to rebuild its war-damaged power sector with the award of several projects in renewable and conventional power generation to international companies over the past months.

“There is a shortage in Iranian gas supplies to Iraq...this has led to a decline of around 7,600 megawatts (MW) in the country’s electricity production,” Electricity Ministry Spokesman Ahmed Mousa told Iraq’s Shafaq News agency.

Mousa said Iranian gas exports to Iraq have dipped to nearly 15 million cubic metres per day in the past few months from more than 20 million cm/d.

Iraq, which controls more than 3.5 trillion cubic metres of untapped natural gas resources, has spoken of plans to offset lower Iranian gas supplies with imports from Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan.

(Writing by SA Kader; Editing by Anoop Menon)

(anoop.menon@lseg.com)

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