Iranian official: Iran now among world’s 6 turbine manufacturers

TEHRAN,July 18(MNA) – Iran is one of the six countries in the world that manufacture gas and steam powered turbines, the managing director of Iran Power Plant Projects Management Company (MAPNA) said. The Mehr News Agency quoted Abbas Aliabadi as saying that the company is the major producer of turbines of the Middle East. Iran is gearing up to produce 'home-made’ gas turbines. "A contract has been signed with Oil Turbo-Compressor Company to make a 100 percent indigenous [gas] turbine," Iran's deputy oil minister, Mohammad-Reza Moqaddam, said in April. Moqaddam said Iran's industry would be ready to manufacture indigenous gas turbines, following two years of extensive research and study by the Oil Ministry. Provided all goes according to plan, the first national Iranian gas turbine will be finished in 2015, he forecast. With this move, Iran could become the first member state of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to produce gas turbines.