Iran: Instructions for use. Part IV: Results

At the end of January 2024, a representative delegation from Empress Catherine II Saint Petersburg Mining University spent a working week in Shiraz, the second capital of the Islamic Republic of Iran, at the invitation of Shiraz University. The administrators, scientists and young teachers studied in detail the methodology of the educational system of the country, its scientific component, visited the enterprises of Fars Province, held a number of negotiations with representatives of the university, industrialists, employees of state bodies.

The trip culminated in a series of scientific-practical seminars, where the parties exchanged experience both in the field of education, including modernisation of the system of engineers' training within the framework of the reform carried out at the Mining University, and scientific developments. The Iranian Ministries of Petroleum and Industry, Mines and Trade made extensive presentations on possible "points of contact".

The officials from Tehran who came specially to meet the Petersburgers were well informed about the Mining University's capabilities. In many respects, this was thanks to Hamed Jafarpour, who works in the department of international activities at the Mining University. However, the Russian engineers managed to surprise their hosts with extended presentations of the capabilities of their structural divisions.

The country, which has been under Western sanctions for forty-four years and is extremely interested in its technological development, sees today's Russia as a strategic partner. Fifty per cent of Iran's budget comes from hydrocarbons and petrochemicals. OPEC data show that Iran has the third largest proven oil reserves in the world. It has a total of over 20 billion tonnes of black gold in its subsoil, with geological exploration of the country's territory at about 50%. Iran also ranks third in terms of natural gas production with 256.7 billion cubic metres.

The Islamic Republic's oil industry is currently at a turning point. There are about 150 oil and gas fields on the balance sheet of the state, of which only one hundred are exploited.

"The peculiarity and competitive advantage of Iran's oil industry is the fact that about 80 per cent of developed deposits are at the initial stage of development and have a significant amount of residual reserves. At the same time, the oil recovery factor is only about 24 per cent (in the Russian Federation it averages 34 per cent). Despite this low figure, there are only 3 pilot projects in operation in the country to introduce a system of reservoir pressure maintenance through water injection. The low efficiency is explained by the impossibility to fully utilise modern scientific and technological solutions for enhanced oil recovery under the sanctions, as well as by the difficulty of attracting large foreign investors for this purpose," Dmitry Tananykhin, Dean of the Oil and Gas Faculty of Mining University, assessed the prospects of one of the areas of cooperation.

Iranian fields practically do not use hydraulic fracturing technology, which could double oil recovery. Besides, the profitability of production there ends at 25 per cent of water content in oil. In Russia, thanks to the introduction of advanced technologies, including those developed by Mining University scientists, this parameter can reach 98 per cent.

During the meeting with the Russian delegation, Mohammad Hossein Ghazal, Director of the Engineering Support Department of the National Iranian South Oil Company, and representatives of the Oil and Gas Department of Shiraz University expressed interest in establishing joint research groups under the general guidance of Russian specialists. It is obvious to the host party that the level of competence of Gorny's specialists, as well as the technical capabilities of the partner companies, can significantly increase the efficiency of hydrocarbon reserves extraction.

Another area of co-operation could be the production of needle coke. This is a structured carbon material used for the production of graphitised electrodes for high and ultra-high capacity arc steelmaking furnaces. The demand for it on the part of Iran's metallurgical industry is about one hundred thousand tonnes per year. The world's metallurgy is gradually moving away from converters and open-hearth furnaces to electric furnaces, which allow not only to remelt scrap, but also to produce ultra-high quality steel and aluminium.

Shazand oil refinery is building five delayed coking units in the city of Arak. Shiraz University is extremely interested in the research results obtained by the scientific centre "Resource Processing" of St. Petersburg Mining University, which has developed its own technology for producing needle coke from oil feedstock using a modifier corresponding to premium foreign grades.

The Islamic State has seven per cent of the world's mineral wealth. According to the most conservative estimates, this is $770 billion (excluding hydrocarbons). These figures were announced at a meeting with the Director of the Mining Department of Iran's Ministry of Industry, Mines and Trade, Dr. Houman Hadiyan, and the Director of the Fars Province Mining Engineers Organisation, Sherafat Mohammad Hosein. As part of it, a number of specific proposals were also made to the Petersburgers, in which the Iranian side is interested.

"The Iranians outlined a request to organise on the basis of the Mining Permanent two-week educational courses for management and engineering staff of mining companies in Fars Province. In total, these are 62 areas, such as surface and underground mining, mine transport and heavy-duty machinery, geoecology, labour protection and industrial safety. The Iranian side sees it as a cycle of theoretical lectures and practical training on simulators of Caterpillar mining equipment and open-pit heavy-duty transport in BELAZ laboratories, visits to Gorny's polygons in Sablino, Vodokanal, and mining enterprises.

"They are interested in the experience of our work in Antarctica, methods of geological exploration at great depths, modernisation of mining equipment and methods of its use, including intellectualisation of transport logistics and modelling of drive systems of mining machines," commented Marat Rudakov, Director of the Institute of Targeted Educational Programmes.

For example, the Republic is now "struggling" with the design of wastewater treatment systems and their further use - in the country it is plus twenty in winter and water quality problems are painful. Iranians are also interested in the experience of the Gorny Scientific Centre for Assessment of Technogenic Transformation of Ecosystems in the restoration of natural hydro-ecosystems, preparation and production of adsorbents and bioabsorbents, use of greenhouse gases for the production of valuable chemicals, waste management and restoration of disturbed lands.

"Currently, there are about 700 mining sites in Fars Province, which employ more than 2,500 specialists interested in advanced training at Mining University. The results of this training will be taken into account by the Organisation of Mining Engineers of Iran when issuing certificates of qualification. The Iranian side is ready to fully cover the costs of organising and conducting such courses, and Shiraz University is ready to form groups and ensure their dispatch to St. Petersburg. The Iranian Ministry of Industry, Mines and Trade is ready to issue a special decree obliging all mining employers in Fars Province, as a pilot region, and subsequently in Iran as a whole, to improve their qualifications at Mining University," said Marat Rudakov.

The results of the negotiations between the Vice-Rector for International Activities, Evgeny Lyubin, and the university administration and its Rector, Professor Moazeni, look no less promising:

"Shiraz University has signed agreements with ninety-one universities from 25 countries of the European Union, China, Japan and the Middle East. Recently, due to the strengthening of sanctions against Iran, most of the existing bilateral agreements are formal and remain only on paper. But the treaty with Gorny is considered to be a working one here. Last year, 15 students from Shiraz took part in summer schools at Gorny, which were organised jointly with the International Centre of Competence in Mining Education under the auspices of UNESCO. Our partners would like to continue this practice, but in a bilateral format. In addition, the Iranian side is interested in establishing, together with the University of Oman, an Iranian branch of the UNESCO Centre on the basis of Shiraz University," said Evgeny Lyubin.

A separate area of international cooperation can be mutual participation of university representatives in various events held in Russia and Iran. Thus, as part of our country's presidency in BRICS in 2024, the official programme includes the International Forum-Competition "Actual Problems of Subsoil Use" for young scientists from the member countries of this association to be held in October on the basis of Mining University. Representatives of Iran, as an official member of BRICS from 1 January 2024, are ready to take part in this event. And Shiraz University plans not only to send its representatives to the City on the Neva, but also to become a key partner in the official national selection.

Both parties are clearly interested in expanding the Visiting Professor programme, both in-person and online. Of particular note is the proposal of Shiraz University to organise 3-4 day specialised courses on cyber security in the mining and oil and gas industry for Mining University specialists and profile companies from the Russian Federation.

In order to solve organisational issues of interaction more quickly, Mohammad Hussein Sheikhi, Director of Research at Shiraz, suggested that Mining University should send a graduate of a master's or postgraduate programme for employment at Shiraz University, who could act as an official representative from the Russian side, ensuring coordination of all programmes.

Iran is still "terra incognita" for Russia. For St. Petersburg miners, it is no longer: their partners and friends live and work here. And they also read Dostoevsky's books in Farsi. Of course, St. Petersburg's "White Nights"...

Speaking of language. In Iran, very many people speak English fluently. The programme of compulsory teaching of technical English adopted in Gorny a few years ago has borne fruit. During the discussions, no interpreter was needed for any generation of guests.

And one more assessment of the significance of the visit - almost all of Iran's leading media wrote about it:

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