By: AGBI

Iraq has approved plans to build power plants able to generate more than 10,000 megawatts, aiming to run them on locally produced fuel as part of efforts to phase out its reliance on gas imports from Iran.

Mohammed Al Sudani, Iraq’s prime minister, said earlier this year that Baghdad would be able to halt gas supplies from Tehran by 2028.

However, Iraq has been plunged into an electricity crisis.

A short-term plan to replace Iranian gas with supplies from Turkmenistan has stalled due to Baghdad’s failure to find a company that will guarantee the supplies are uninterrupted – since Turkmen gas has to pass through sanctions-hit Iran.

The power plants planned by Iraq’s Ministry of Electricity will be in Baghdad, the southern port of Basra and the central Najaf province, the ministry’s spokesman Ahmed Mousa said at the weekend.

“We have already obtained approval for other power projects in Kirkuk and Faw. All these new plants will provide Iraq with more than 10MW in new power supplies,” he said.

The plants are “part of a new strategy to allow Iraq to be self-sufficient in electricity”, Mousa said. “The plan also includes the construction of more solar power plants and waste-to-energy projects.”

Iran, which controls the world’s second-largest proven gas deposits, had supplied Iraq with nearly 50 million cubic metres of gas per day under a contract signed in 2017. 

But supplies have dropped more than half over the past few months as Iran was hit by a surge in domestic consumption and slow growth in production caused by sanctions.

Sudani’s 2028 pledge is based on an expected surge in Iraqi gas production when major field development projects awarded over the past two years are completed.

Iraq’s electricity generation capacity is estimated at 20-25 gigawatts but demand could peak at nearly 50GW during summer.

The announcement comes ahead of Iraq’s parliamentary election, scheduled for November 11.