BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - The state-run Iraq Drilling Company plans to drill 180 oil wells in 2010, and will be able to drill more than 250 new wells every year from 2011 onwards, the head of the company said.

Thirty of the new wells planned for 2010 will be in northern oilfields and 150 in the south, adding roughly 360,000 barrels of oil per day to Iraq's output capacity, Iraqi Drilling Company director Idrees al-Yassiri told Reuters in an interview.

The number of new wells next year will exceed the total number drilled in the 6-1/2 years since the U.S. invasion, he said on Thursday.