The state-run Fars News Agency, affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), reported that the use of mazut has begun in Iran’s power plants, adding that the Mofatteh, Salimi, and Shazand power plants hold the record for consuming this highly polluting fuel. (Fars is one of Iran’s major state-run media outlets linked to the IRGC.)
Fars reported on Sunday, November 23, that mazut consumption reached more than 21 million liters per day on November 14. The length of the tanker trucks required to transport such a volume of mazut would reach 14 kilometers.
Last year, due to a shortage of natural gas, mazut consumption in Iran reached a record high.
According to Fars, the Hamedan, Neka (located in Mazandaran province), and Arak power plants have the highest mazut consumption in the country.
About ten days earlier, Abbas Aliabadi, Iran’s regime energy minister, had said that there are 14 mazut-burning power plants across the country and that if “the weather becomes very cold and gas supplies decrease,” the government would burn mazut to generate electricity.
Without acknowledging the impact of this fuel on air pollution and public health, he said: “We are not interested in burning mazut because it damages the power plants and mazut is an expensive commodity. We would prefer to turn it into a product, but in case of a gas shortage, we are forced to burn mazut.”
Officials in Masoud Pezeshkian’s government have repeatedly promised to stop mazut burning in Iran’s power plants and replace it with clean fuel.
Fatemeh Mohajerani, the government spokesperson, wrote in a post on X in November 2024 that for a limited period, “scheduled blackouts” could replace “producing poison” for the public.
These remarks came shortly after the summer blackouts of that same year and coincided with the beginning of gas outages for citizens.
At that time, Iran’s state-run news agencies announced that by order of Pezeshkian, the regime’s president, mazut burning would be stopped at the Arak, Karaj, and Isfahan power plants.
Despite the promise to halt mazut burning, it continued. In some regions, air pollution became so severe that residents took to the streets in protest. In Arak, the protests continued until March 2025.
Three months after the announcement of the order to halt mazut burning, in February 2025, Somayeh Rafiei, spokesperson for the Agriculture Committee of the regime’s parliament, stated that all thermal power plants in the country had turned to burning mazut.
The state-run Tejarat News website reported in August that contrary to previous promises by officials of the Iranian regime, mazut burning has become an “official and reliable” option for the government in managing the energy crisis, and this practice was ongoing even last year.
