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22/02/2008 | Iraq, Iran and Oil Diplomacy

Stratfor Staff

Iraqi Oil Minister Hussein Shahristani said on Tuesday that Iraq and Iran will set up a joint committee soon to manage oil development in the two states’ southern border region, according to the Baghdad-based Al-Sabah daily. Most of Iraq and Iran’s oil is concentrated in this border area, and developing the fields that straddle the border would revitalize oil output in both countries.

 

One of Iran’s major interests in Iraq, after its own national security, is accessing oil wealth. Whether Iraq turns out to be a unitary state or is effectively divided into three parts, Iran has a significant interest in these fields. This interest is intensified by geography. Developing energy reserves in border regions is a tricky business. Because the oil reservoirs are not particularly distinct, tapping a field close to the border can drop reservoir pressure — and thus production — on the other side.

This becomes especially important once slant drilling — the practice of sending off secondary underground shafts perpendicular to the main well — begins. In fact, one of the reasons former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein gave for invading Kuwait in August 1990 was that Kuwait was slant drilling into Iraq’s Rumaila field. The thinking in Baghdad and Tehran, then, is that it is best to jointly work on the border region so that any misunderstandings are kept small and addressed early. Or, at the very least, so goes the thinking in the Shiite-dominated Iraqi Oil Ministry and in Iran.

There are two paths here. On one, the Shiites in the South adopt the Kurdish model, creating a regional government and providing access to the oil fields on their terms. The other path would require a national Iraqi oil strategy involving several preliminary steps, among them the adoption of a meaningful petroleum law in Baghdad and an end to the insurgency. Additionally, for the border areas to be developed, there would need to be political settlement between Tehran and both Baghdad and the United States, Iraq’s security guarantor. Either way, the possibilities for future oil production — particularly on the Iraqi side of the border — are impressive.

Currently, the five major oil fields on the Iraqi side of the border — Buzurgan, Al Noor, Halfaya, Majnoon and Nahr Umr — collectively produce about 150,000 barrels per day (bpd). Estimates completed by Western prospecting firms before the 2003 war indicate that their total potential is at least 1.5 million bpd, and this figure does not include potential increases at the Buzurgan field. (Buzurgan was the site of significant fighting — and mining — during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, so studies of its potential capabilities are still pending.)

Of particular interest to both sides is the Majnoon field. Its current Iraqi output is only 50,000 bpd, but with estimated reserves of 20 billion barrels, it is Iraq’s largest field. Baghdad estimates that it alone could produce 600,000 bpd if investment monies were available and a deal were struck with Iran.

We need to look at these actions in the context of the U.S.-Iranian discussions. Washington does not want a fragmented Iraq. If the country were fragmented, the southern portion would — the United States has to assume — fall under direct Iranian control. The Iranians also don’t want fragmentation, since this would create a Sunni state in the center that could, over the years, challenge Iran in the South and directly threaten it.

But fragmentation certainly would be more troubling to the Americans than the Iranians, since it could bring Iranian military power to the Saudi border. Therefore, by moving forward with oil development in the South and hinting at proceeding without a national oil law, the Iranians are raising the specter of fragmentation in the American mind. The postponed bilateral talks and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s March 2 visit to Iraq should both be viewed within the context of each side playing on the worst fears of the other — and that certainly includes an Iranian presence in Iraq’s southern oil fields, completely bypassing the Baghdad government by having the Shia emulate the Kurds.

Stratfor (Estados Unidos)

 



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