Iran is seeking more electricity from Turkey and Turkmenistan as war damage and other outages leave thousands of megawatts of industrial and petrochemical power capacity offline, even as Washington presses neighboring countries to help restrict Tehran’s remaining economic routes.
Mohammad Allahdad, head of Iran’s electricity company Tavanir, told ILNA that about 4,700 megawatts of generation capacity belonging to industries and petrochemical companies had gone offline for various reasons.
He said the infrastructure was now in place for petrochemical plants to receive imported electricity from Turkey through Iran’s national grid. The companies have not yet signed contracts for the supply.
“If this does not happen, supplying electricity to these industries will face challenges,” Allahdad said.
War damage drives import push
Allahdad said serious damage during the war to utilities serving petrochemical complexes had sharply increased their dependence on the national grid. Iran supplied the sector with six times as much electricity this summer as in previous years, he said.
He added that Iran currently had no plans to export electricity and was instead focused on increasing imports, particularly during the winter.
Iran is also negotiating with Turkmenistan to extend an existing electricity import agreement and increase the volume of power exchanged between the two countries, according to a government statement.
Officials have also discussed additional cross-border power lines and the possible transit of electricity through Turkmenistan to third countries, though those proposals remain subject to technical and economic studies.
US seeks to close remaining economic routes
The push for additional electricity imports comes as the United States broadens its economic campaign against Iran beyond oil exports and financial sanctions.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said this week Washington was working with Turkey and Pakistan to restrict Iran’s overland commercial routes, while describing the United Arab Emirates and Oman as partners in the broader pressure campaign.
“We did have a maximum pressure campaign. Now we have an absolute isolation campaign and it’s working,” Bessent told Newsmax.
Bessent has also said Washington is targeting Iran-linked cryptocurrency and its remaining shipping network. Treasury on Thursday sanctioned 17 vessels and their owners, saying they were part of what remained of Iran’s shadow fleet, while Bessent said the US could seize about $1 billion in Iran-linked digital assets.
The overlap puts Turkey in an unusual position, with Tehran seeking greater electricity supplies from its western neighbor while Washington says Ankara is also cooperating in efforts to constrict Iran’s remaining overland economic links.
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