With oil prices steady around 80 dollars, OPEC countries are returning to energy investment projects postponed at the height of the economic crisis, while foreign firms are playing a major role.
OPEC nations used the sidelines of this week's meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to speak about their plans for significant investments in energy infrastructures.
The cartel that pumps 40 percent of world oil agreed to freeze its output ceiling at a meeting in Vienna on Wednesday against a backdrop of recovering oil prices.
And with oil demand set to rise over the long term, investment in the energy sector, from drilling projects to building new refineries is essential.
"All our delayed projects are in motion now as prices move up," OPEC Secretary General Abdalla Salem El-Badri told reporters after the cartel's latest output announcement.
Iran, OPEC's second biggest oil exporter behind Saudi Arabia, said on Wednesday that it is looking to invest up to 200 billion dollars (145 billion euros) in the country's oil sector over the next five years, with or without the help of foreign companies.
"If other countries are not interested... we do have Iranian companies that have this potential," Iran's Oil Minister Masoud Mirkazemi said.
Foreign companies could be put off investing in Iran should the country face tougher UN sanctions over its nuclear stand-off with the West.
But others, such as Chinese state companies, are certain to help out.
China presently has a huge stake in Iran's energy sector. Iran's vice oil minister Hossein Noqrehkar-Shirazi said last year that China would invest 48-50 billion dollars in oil and gas ventures.
"Iran needs to improve its (energy) infrastructure that's for sure," noted VTB Capital analyst Andrey Kryuchenkov.
"Foreigners including China will always seek to get access to cheaper oil, hence they have to live with some geopolitical concerns," he said.
Another OPEC country keen to ramp up investment is Ecuador, currently overseeing the cartel's rotating presidency.
Ecuadoran Oil Minister Germanico Pinto said in Vienna that the Latin American country has been talking with several organisations about potential investment.
"Especially we've been talking to public companies in several places in the world. We talked with several public companies in Russia, we did also in other countries and we expect that we are able to define strategic agreements with several companies this year," he told reporters.
Westhouse Securities energy market analyst David Hart said oil companies were ready to come to the table owing to the current level of oil prices.
"It looks like the price has reached a range where it is not tipping economies back into recession, OPEC are satisfied and oil companies feel they can invest in major projects."
OPEC chief El-Badri on Wednesday said oil prices were at a "comfortable" level for the present economic climate.
"If world growth were higher than the one we are seeing, then maybe prices would be different. But at this time, with world growth at 3.4 percent, a range of 70-80 dollars is fine," he said.
Prices have recovered massively since plunging to 32 dollars a barrel in December 2008 amid the worst global economic downturn since the 1930s.
Only five months earlier, in July 2008, crude futures had struck record highs of more than 147 dollars owing to unrest in Iran and other supply concerns.
One OPEC member which is already pushing ahead with massive energy infrastructure investment is Iraq, which recently auctioned off oil fields to foreign groups.
Norway's StatoilHydro and Russian energy giant Lukoil have signed a deal to develop Iraq's West Qurna-2 oil field, which is expected to dramatically increase the country's crude production to 12 million barrels a day by 2017 compared with only about 2.4 million currently.
OPEC meanwhile has had an official output level, excluding production by Iraq, of 24.84 million barrels a day since January 2009.
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