Iran and Qatar Cooperation in Gas Production from South Pars (North Dome) Gas-Condensate Field: A Game Theory Framework

The purpose of this article is to examine the cooperation between Iran and Qatar in withdrawal of shared reservoirs of South Pars gas field (in Qatar: North Dome) by using game theory. The failure of a credible international agreement in determining the magnitude of the exploitation has led Qatar to become more promising by investing more in its oil and gas industries than Iran; this imbalance has caused a rash and pernicious competition. Following this incident, the main purpose of the paper is to examine the type of communication (cooperative or non-cooperative) through the game theory to achieve an optimal economic strategy for Iran. Results based on non-cooperative game design, solving methods through methods of elimination of dominated strategies (dominate strategies equilibrium), and Nash equilibrium showed that choosing the non-cooperative strategy is optimized for both countries and non-cooperation has more economic benefits for Iran.