OPEC pumps quarter of a million more b/d in May
June 13, 2014 | By
Barbara Vergetis Lundin
In May, oil production from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) rose for the third consecutive month to total 29.97 million barrels per day (b/d) -- up 250,000 b/d from April, according to a Platts survey of OPEC and oil industry officials and analysts. The call on OPEC crude is 30.7 million b/d for the third and fourth quarters of 2014, according to the International Energy Agency. "That means OPEC needs to add about 1 million b/d of output from what we estimate the group produced in May," said John Kingston, Platts global director of news. "This is a tall task, given how many countries in OPEC are under all sorts of politically-linked limitations on increasing output. The Saudis may be called upon to open their taps wider than they normally prefer." OPEC's top producer, Saudi Arabia, boosted output last month by 100,000 b/d to 9.75 million b/d -- the kingdom's highest volume since January's estimated 9.76 million b/d, according to the survey. Other smaller output increases in May came from Angola, Ecuador, Iraq, Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates. The only production decrease in May came from Libya, where political chaos and civil strife is keeping crude production at a fraction of pre-2011 uprising levels of close to 1.6 million b/d, according to Platts. Demand for OPEC crude is expected to average more than 30 million barrels per day during the second half of 2014, according to Platts. For more: © 2014 FierceMarkets, a division of Questex Media Group LLC. All rights reserved. http://www.fierceenergy.com/story/opec-pumps-quarter-million-more-bd-may/2014-06-13 |