Iran Restarts South Pars Gas Output After Israeli Strikes, But Full Recovery Remains Uncertain

Iran restored natural gas production at three offshore platforms in the South Pars field on May 31, 2026, after a two-and-a-half-month shutdown caused by Israeli airstrikes. The platforms themselves were never physically damaged; the suspension occurred because Israeli missiles hit the onshore processing facilities that receive and treat the extracted gas . The restart is a tactical workaround—rerouting raw gas to alternative processing plants—rather than a full strategic recovery, and it unfolds within a wider war that has upended Persian Gulf energy flows.

What Infrastructure Was Damaged

On March 18, 2026, Israeli forces struck the Asaluyeh petrochemical hub and installations connected to the South Pars field in Bushehr Province, damaging storage tanks, gas installations, refineries, and supply and transmission pipelines . The attack took roughly 12% of Iran’s total natural gas production offline by halting output at two refineries . Among the specific targets was Phase 14 of the South Pars refinery, where a fire in one of four processing trains temporarily suspended about 12 million cubic meters per day of gas production . Separately, the Fajr Jam gas processing complex was also hit, but its two damaged trains were fully repaired by January 2026 .

Crucially, the offshore extraction platforms sustained no physical damage. They were idled only because the onshore plants that process their output were unavailable, leaving the gas with nowhere to go .

Workarounds and the State of Phase 14

Iran restarted the three offshore platforms by diverting raw gas to other processing plants in the region while repairs continued at damaged onshore facilities, including the Phase 14 refinery . Touraj Dehqani, CEO of Pars Oil and Gas Company, confirmed the rerouting strategy and credited Iranian specialists for the progress .

Phase 14’s story illustrates the uneven recovery. The damaged unit—one of four processing trains—was repaired and returned to operation after roughly ten days by late June 2025 . By early July 2025, three of the four trains at the 2-billion-cubic-feet-per-day plant were back online, but the fourth 500-million-cubic-feet-per-day train remained offline . Reports from May 31, 2026, mention that three offshore platforms have resumed output and that production is being routed to alternative plants, yet they do not confirm that the fourth Phase 14 train has been fully restored . The available evidence suggests Phase 14 is still operating below its pre-strike capacity.

A direct consequence of the loss of onshore processing was that Iran halted its gas supply to Iraq after the March 18 strikes .

The Broader War and Hormuz Crisis

The partial restart is impossible to separate from the larger conflict. The US and Israel launched Operation Epic Fury on February 28, 2026, striking Iranian nuclear, command, and energy sites and killing Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei . Iran retaliated with missile and drone attacks on US assets and Gulf energy infrastructure, including Qatar’s Ras Laffan LNG facility, which forced QatarEnergy to declare force majeure on some supply contracts .

Iran also effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz using IRGC drone swarms, sea mines, and a declared maritime no-go zone, eliminating an estimated 80–90% of the normal 20-million-barrel-per-day transit by mid-March . In May 2026, Iran institutionalized its control by creating the Persian Gulf Strait Authority (PGSA) to regulate strait passage, while Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE pursued separate diplomatic channels to maintain some tanker movements .

Diplomacy has been halting. Dozens of countries, excluding the US and Israel, launched efforts to reopen the strait by early April 2026, but no comprehensive breakthrough was reached . A temporary ceasefire was agreed on April 8, and by late May 2026, US and Iranian negotiators reportedly reached a deal to reopen the strait and extend a ceasefire for 60 days while broader peace talks begin . Even those steps leave the region’s energy architecture deeply unsettled.

What the Partial Recovery Actually Means

The May 31 restart is a tactical fix, not a strategic recovery. Iran’s overall gas output remains well below pre-war levels, export capacity is crippled, and the Strait of Hormuz transit architecture is fundamentally disrupted . While Iranian officials frame the restart as a triumph of domestic expertise , the broader reality is that Persian Gulf energy supplies remain in deep uncertainty—shaped as much by whether the strait truly reopens as by the status of damaged refineries onshore.