Reports published in local media on Sunday said that a domestic company had won a contract for a mazut desulfurization project in the southern Shiraz Refinery.
The contract will enable the refinery, which is one of the oldest in Iran, to reduce the sulfur content in its mazut output and to use it as feedstock for the production of high-value oil products.
The head of the state-run fuel company NIORDC said in a ceremony to award the contract that Iran has plans to carry out similar mazut desulfurization projects in 10 large refineries in the country.
Jalil Salari would not elaborate on the exact financial details of the projects.
However, the Shiraz Refinery said it had earmarked some $350 million worth of desulfurization projects to boost the quality of gasoline and diesel produced in the refinery.
Salari said mazut desulfurization projects had already been carried out in refineries in Bandar Abbas in the south and in Shazand in central Iran.
He said that the Kermanshah Refinery, located in western Iran, would soon roll out a similar project to boost the quality of its mazut output.
Mazut accounts for a bulk of output in some of Iran’s major refineries that rely on old technology.
The Iranian government has spent heavily in recent years to carry out major renovation projects in refineries, helping boost fuel quality in the country.
The projects have mostly relied on domestic resources as Iran’s oil sector is barred from international technology and investment markets because of US sanctions.
MNA/PressTV