National Iranian Oil Company's (NIOC) Discovery Affairs Director announced here Friday discovery of a new natural gas field in Masjed Soleiman region.

Engineer Seyyed Mahmoud Mohaddes who was speaking at Iran's 13th International Gas, Oil and Petrochemistry Exhibition said, "The technical surveys done at Asmari Mountain, 30 kilometers to the south of Masjed Soleiman, it was revealed that back in 1975 a group of excavators had dug this mountain, but due to the difficulties of digging, they had not succeeded to find hydrocarbon resources and abandoned their well."

He added, "In order to make sure we have access to sufficient gas resources to feed Mahshahr's Razi Petrochemical Complex, we decided to dig the jurassic layer of Asmari Mountain again, for which we stationed the digging derrick at the desirable location late last April.

Mohaddes reiterated, "By the end of the last (Iranian) year (1386 - ended on March 21, 2008), we had managed to dig up to 4,380 meters depth and finally we discovered the sour gas field whose capacity is 985 billion cubic feet, of which 739 billion cubic meters can be produced using the current facilities.