Iraq Oil Exports Hit 25-Year High In February

AFP

Iraq exported 2.8 million barrels of oil per day in February, a top minister said Saturday, a sharp month-on-month gain and the highest such figure in at least a quarter-century.

Production, meanwhile, reached 3.5 million bpd, the deputy prime minister for energy affairs, Hussein al-Shahristani, told reporters in the southern port city of Basra as he inaugurated a refinery.

"Production in February was 3.5 million barrels per day, and we exported 2.8 million barrels per day," he said.

The export figure was the highest since then dictator Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, triggering a crippling embargo and international sanctions that massively restricted Iraq's energy industry.

In 2012, when average daily exports reached 2.5 million barrels per day, the oil ministry said it was the highest such figure since 1989.

Shahristani said February output would have been significantly higher if not for energy disputes with the country's three-province autonomous Kurdish region.

Most of Iraq's crude is exported via its southern terminals near Basra, but a significant portion goes through a northern pipeline that is periodically bombed by militants.

Iraq says Big Oil to spend $25 bln next yr, despite unrest

REUTERS     Peg Mackey and Ahmed Rasheed

 
* Foreign oil firms due to spend over $25 bln in 2014
* Oil output in south expected to rise by average 500,000 bpd
* Giant southern oilfields, central fields seen safe from attack
* Smaller Nineveh oilfields, Anbar gasfield more vulnerable
* China seeks over 1 million bpd of Iraqi crude

Big Oil is poised to spend over $25 billion next year to boost output from Iraq's giant oilfields towards record rates, Iraq's deputy prime minister for energy said, even as Baghdad struggles to control spillover from the civil war in Syria.

Far from harm's way, the prized oilfields of southern Iraq - drivers of the country's oil expansion - are expected to pump an extra 500,000 barrels per day (bpd) in 2014, said Hussain al-Shahristani. Total output this year is set to average just over 3 million bpd, holding Iraq's rank as OPEC's no. 2 producer.

But Baghdad is raising its guard at the smaller fields of Najmah and Qayara - operated by Angolan Sonangol, which lie in the al-Qaeda heartland of Nineveh province in the northwest and at the Akkas gasfield, operated by South Korea's Kogas, in the western Anbar province near the Syrian border, he said.

"We are definitely concerned about the upsurge in violence, but our concern is for the Iraqi people throughout the country. Iraq is trying its best to combat terrorism," he said in an interview in his office in the heavily fortified green zone.

"The security situation has not affected the oilfields in the south and central Iraq and we haven't noticed any hesitation or slow down in investment by the companies."

Iraq Energy Profile: Has Surpassed Iran In Producing Crude Oil – Analysis

EIA

Iraq has the fifth largest proven crude oil reserves in the world, and it passed Iran as the second largest producer of crude oil in OPEC at the end of 2012.

Iraq was the world’s eighth largest producer of total petroleum liquids in 2012, and it has the world’s fifth largest proven petroleum reserves after Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Canada, and Iran. Just a fraction of Iraq’s known fields are in development, and Iraq may be one of the few places left where much of its known hydrocarbon resources has not been fully exploited. Iraq’s energy sector is heavily based on oil. Over 90 percent of its energy needs are met with petroleum (2010 estimate), with the rest supplied by natural gas and hydropower.

Iraq has begun to develop its oil and natural gas reserves after years of sanctions and wars, but it will need to develop its infrastructure in order to reach its production potential. According to estimates by Iraq’s Deputy Prime Minister for Energy, capital expenditures of $30 billion per year in Iraqi energy infrastructure are required to meet Iraq’s production targets. Progress has been hampered by political disputes and the lack of a law to govern development of Iraq’s oil and gas. The proposed Hydrocarbon Law, which would govern contracting and regulation, has been under review in the Council of Ministers since October 26, 2008, but has not received final passage.

Petroleum

Despite having large proven oil reserves, increases in oil production have fallen behind ambitious targets because of infrastructure constraints and political disputes.

Reserves

Iraq revised its estimate of proven oil reserves from 115 billion barrels in 2011 to 141 billion barrels as of January 1, 2013, according to the Oil and Gas Journal. Iraq’s resources are not evenly divided across sectarian-demographic lines. Most known hydrocarbon resources are concentrated in the Shiite areas of the south and the ethnically Kurdish region in the north, with few resources in control of the Sunni minority in central Iraq.

The majority of the known oil and gas reserves in Iraq form a belt that runs along the eastern edge of the country. Iraq has five super-giant fields (over 5 billion barrels) in the south that account for 60 percent of the country’s proven oil reserves. An estimated 17 percent of oil reserves are in the north of Iraq, near Kirkuk, Mosul, and Khanaqin. Control over rights to reserves is a source of controversy between the ethnic Kurds and other groups in the area. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimated that the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) area contained 4 billion barrels of proven reserves. However, this region is now being actively explored, and the KRG stated that this region could contain 45 billion barrels of unproven oil resources.