TEHRAN -- Prospective gas and oil projects will determine the future of oil industry in the Middle East with dolphin gasline, the Iran-India gasline project and Baku-Ceyhan oil pipeline project emerging as the most dominating factors in that respect, a global energy expert was quoted by the Emirati news agency (WAM) as saying on Sunday.

"The dolphin scheme seeks to take advantage of synergies within the Persian Gulf to develop what will, in effect, become the core of an integrated regional gas network," it said.

The Iran-India gasline is a classic example of a project which seeks to link an obvious producer, Iran, with a seemingly obvious market, India, but which faces a multitude of problems because the two countries do not share a common border, it added.

The Baku-Ceyhan pipeline is important in the Middle East context because it shows what can and cannot be achieved," WAM cited John Roberts from Platts energy group as saying.

"The (dolphin) project's current status is that it has concluded a development and production agreement with Qatar petroleum general corporation and has secured exclusive rights to supply the Abu Dhabi water and electricity authority with gas," WAM further quoted him as saying.

Roberts predicts that dolphin could face considerable competition in trying to expand beyond the Persian Gulf with crescent petroleum still pushing to supply gas from Qatar to Pakistan by means of its Persian Gulf-South Asia gasline project, it said.

Iran is also considering supplies to Pakistan in its efforts to develop a pipeline to India.