<\/p>\n Read more: Where Switzerland stands on the Iran war
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Swiss company involved in repair work<\/p>\n
Sulzer, which has supplied the oil and gas industry for decades, is now playing a role in the repairs. Company spokesperson Marl\u00e8ne Betschart says: \u201cWe have service centres across all affected areas. Thanks to this proximity, we can repair the damaged infrastructure quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/ras_laffan.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
A Google Earth aerial view of QatarEnergy, Shell and Sulzer\u2019s facilities in Ras Laffan, Qatar. <\/p>\n
Google Earth \/ SRF <\/p>\n
However, \u201cquickly\u201d is relative. The scale of the damage is decisive. At Ras Laffan, repairs are expected to take years. \u201cThese facilities are complex and require multiple contractors working on site to restore them to working order,\u201d Betschart says.<\/p>\n
She adds that the current work cannot be compared to routine maintenance: \u201cThis is, of course, quite different from regular repair work and may therefore take years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sulzer employs around 500 people in the Gulf, roughly the same number as in Switzerland. One of its six regional service centres, including a full workshop team, is located directly at Ras Laffan.<\/p>\n
Qatar is not an isolated case<\/p>\n
The British energy company Shell also operates a natural gas facility at Ras Laffan that was damaged by Iranian strikes. In its case, Shell expects repair work to take up to a year.<\/p>\n
A similar picture is emerging in the United Arab Emirates, where state oil company ADNOC says its facilities are likely to return to full production within about a year.<\/p>\n
Drilling platforms must resume operations <\/p>\n
The war also forced the shutdown of several offshore drilling platforms in the Persian Gulf. These facilities now need to be brought back online.<\/p>\n
Depending on the situation, this can be a complex process, explains energy expert Cornelia Meyer: \u201cThere are some oil fields that can be brought back online very quickly. But offshore fields in particular take longer. It\u2019s not a light switch; it\u2019s an oil field.\u201d<\/p>\n
This means that restarting operations does not happen at the flick of a switch, as personnel and materials must first be transported back to the platforms.<\/p>\n
All this underlines that the war damage cannot be repaired overnight \u2013 and the consequences are likely to be felt for some time. At Ras Laffan, QatarEnergy says natural gas production will have to be cut by around 20% until all war damage has been repaired.<\/p>\n
Meyer points out that the disruption of the war goes beyond the oil and gas industry. \u201cOther products from the region are also affected, such as fertilisers, aluminium and helium,\u201d she says. Consequently, it will take time for production and supply chains to get back on track.<\/p>\n
Translated from German, sub-edited by Simon Bradley\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Articles in this story <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The scale of the Ras Laffan gas plant in Qatar is immense: the entire site covers an area…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":173698,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[26],"tags":[1162,53375,10535,328,817,53376,39647,39,39649,36,10556],"class_list":["post-173697","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-persian-gulf","tag-article","tag-beat-global-trade","tag-beat-war-peace","tag-business","tag-foreign-affairs","tag-kpi-srg-curation-macroeconomics-economics","tag-multi","tag-persian-gulf","tag-production-type-adaptation","tag-war","tag-work"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173697","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173697"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173697\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/173698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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