Iran is seeking an energy strategy shift after focusing for too long on the West and Europe, according to a Fars News Agency article. The goal now will be to focus on the so-called BRICS countries, the five major emerging economies: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
China and India are major worldwide industrial hubs and are emerging as more powerful countries, the article said. Iran has a new 25-year cooperation agreement with China.
The world will continue to rely on fossil fuels, but that dependency is declining in Western countries, according to Iranian oil experts.
“China’s share of world oil and gas consumption is now 26%, and by 2050 it will be 32%,” the article said. “The share of renewable energy in China is now 5% and will reach 19% in 2050. China’s largest oil consumption is projected at 340 million tons per year and non-combustible consumption at 100 million tons per year.”
Iran has large oil and gas resources, and it needs to reposition itself to supply India and China, the article said.
“The European Union and the United States – due to their large investments in solar energy, wind energy and increasing the production efficiency of energy from their nuclear power plants, and with high savings and technology upgrades – keep their fossil-fuel consumption at the same level or slightly reduced,” the article said.
“They will not need Iranian oil and gas,” it said. “So the main question is whether the direction of the previous governments – in relation to the production and export of oil and gas to Europe and the United States and tying the country’s economy to the five-plus-one negotiations – was correct or not.”
This relates to the Iran-deal countries and whether Tehran was correct to waste time dealing with the West. Iran made a mistake, according to the Fars analysis.
The focus of outgoing President Hassan Rouhani’s administration was strategically wrong, the article said, adding: “They kept the country in limbo for eight years in the form of Iran deal negotiations, hoping that someone who does not need your oil and gas [will negotiate].”
In a sense, the article is saying that Tehran doesn’t need to renegotiate the Iran deal.
“It was a strategic and very harmful mistake that has caused a lot of losses and disadvantages for the country,” the article said.
Iran should focus on Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, it said, adding: “Therefore, the direction and approach of the Ministry of Petroleum in this new government should be to cut off the hopes and expectations of the United States, Europe and OECD countries, and to put serious and strategic negotiations on the agenda with the BRICS countries... and Russia.
“Ideologically, like two trains that do not meet indefinitely, we can provide energy security in the 21st century in... some of the BRICS and our own countries.”
In essence, the article argues that Iran was plowing sand by hoping for Western investment. It needlessly pushed China away for years with hopes of work with Europe. Now it understands that it must move forward with China India and other countries.
This is a shift in mentality for the Foreign Ministry and government heads. It also has ramifications for the Iran deal negotiations with the US because Tehran is hinting it doesn’t even need to return to it.