Iran has stopped natural gas exports to Turkey following an Israeli strike on the giant South Pars gas field last week, according to people familiar with the matter, Bloomberg reports.
Turkey bought about 14% of its natural gas from Iran last year, according to data compiled by the Turkish Natural Gas Distributors Association.
Ankara is still importing gas from Russia and Azerbaijan, its main suppliers, and there are stockpiles that can be used, the people said, asking not to be named because the information is private. It’s unclear how long the halt in Iranian supplies will last. The Turkish Energy Ministry declined to comment.
Israel struck South Pars, the world’s largest natural gas field, on March 18. Tehran retaliated with attacks on energy assets belonging to Arab states in the Persian Gulf, including the Ras Laffan complex in Qatar, which produces about a fifth of global liquefied natural gas.
Those strikes caused European gas futures to jump to their highest level in more than three years. They remained about 66% higher than their pre-war level as of 2:34 p.m. Istanbul time.
Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said in November that the country’s gas storage of 6.3 billion cubic meters was at full capacity. Turkey consumed an average of 230 million cubic meters of gas per day in March last year.
South Pars is vital for both Iran’s domestic electricity generation and its exports. The Islamic Republic also cut flows to neighboring Iraq following the attack on the field, though they have since partially resumed, the electricity ministry in Baghdad said on Monday.
Even in peacetime, Iran has at times suspended gas exports to Turkey, citing technical problems. Reductions usually took place during the winter months, when domestic demand in Iran’s northern areas is high.
