Royal Dutch Shell, Repsol to Develop Iranian Gas Field

Royal Dutch Shell signed a preliminary deal to develop a major Iranian gas field in conjunction with Spain’s Repsol, despite growing US pressure not to invest in Iran.

A Shell spokeswoman said on Monday that Shell had signed a deal on the upstream, gas production, side of its ‘Persian LNG’ project which covers phase 13 and 14 of the South Pars gas field, confirming comments from an Iranian official on Sunday.

However, Shell said it was still a year away from a final decision on whether to proceed with the multi-billion dollar project. That hinges on another agreement, to build an 8 million tonnes per annum liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal.

“We have signed an upstream service agreement as part of our work to assess the feasibility of the project,” a spokeswoman said. “Implementation of the upstream service agreement is subject to taking a final decision to proceed with the midstream LNG project.”

In the past year, Washington has increased pressure on non-US companies not to invest in Iran.