On the anniversary of the nationalization of Iran's oil industry in 1951, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Monday inaugurated the first part of the second phase of the Abadan refinery. The opening of this phase will add 210,360 barrels to the refinery's production per day, bringing its total production to <>,<> barrels per day.

The initial investment in the second phase amounted to €1.2 billion. With the opening of this phase, the 110-year-old Abadan refinery will be fully operational and will produce Euro 5 gasoline.

According to Iranian Oil Minister Javad Oji, gasoline production will rise with the start of the second phase of the Abadan refinery from 10 million liters to 14 million liters and diesel from 15 million liters to 18 million liters per day at this refinery.

Oji added that his country produces 3 million and 850 thousand barrels of oil per day, and pointed out that Iran earns $ 12 from each barrel of oil.

According to the official Iranian news agency IRNA, the Abadan refinery is the first refinery in West Asia established in 1912. Until the start of the Iran-Iraq war in 1980, it was the world's largest refinery with 628,7 barrels of oil per day, and is wholly owned by the state and currently employs <>,<> people.

Iranian agencies quoted Iranian officials as saying that after the opening of the second phase, the refinery will produce 30% of fuel (gasoline) in Iran, after previously providing 25% of Iranian gasoline.

Plug

Economist Peyman Mawlawi believes that the opening of the second phase of the Abadan refinery represents an Iranian will under Western sanctions, and Molavi adds in his speech to Al Jazeera Net that despite the damage borne by the Iranian economy from weak oil sales due to sanctions, there is remarkable progress in the Iranian oil industry, albeit slowly.

Molavi explained that Iran's losses due to its inability to sell oil due to sanctions over the past ten years exceeded $ 450 billion.

Abadan refinery could help fill part of Iran's gasoline production deficit (Reuters)

Mawlawi says that gasoline consumption in Iran is 145 million liters per day, while gasoline production in the country is 110 million liters per day, and the production deficit reaches 35 million liters per day, and the Abadan refinery aims to fill part of this deficit.

Molavi explained that the Iranian government should speed up the establishment of more refineries to avoid importing gasoline, stressing that the reason for the high percentage of gasoline consumption is due to the poor quality of Iranian cars.

Economist Bahman Arman points out that the refinery's production is currently less than half of its total daily production before the Iran-Iraq war.

Arman justified, in his interview with Al Jazeera Net, the high consumption ratio of Iranian gasoline compared to the rate of global consumption to the cheap price of gasoline locally, as well as the lack of modern technical standards in Iranian cars, he said.

Nationalization of the oil industry

March 20 marks in Iranian memory the nationalization of Iran's oil industry in 1951 after Britain had controlled Iranian oil since 1913 through the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, which had been established since the discovery of oil in the southwestern Iranian city of Masjed Soleyman for the first time in 1908.

According to the official Iranian agency "IRNA", Mohammad Mossadegh is considered the leader of the oil nationalization movement in Iran after being chosen as prime minister by the Iranian parliament at the time, where the parliament voted to nationalize the oil industry and Prime Minister Ismail Razm Ara refused to act on the decision, which led to his resignation and then assassination by the group "Fedayeen al-Islam" supporting the nationalization of oil and replacing it with Mossadegh.

The source confirms that the Iranians did not reap the fruits of nationalizing the oil industry easily, as they were forced months later to close the Abadan refinery, which was one of the largest oil refineries in the world at the time, because Britain incited the world to refrain from buying Iranian oil, which led to a significant decline in Iranian sales.