Iraq raised its estimate of national crude oil reserves to 143.1 billion barrels, Oil Minister Hussain Al-Shahristani said today, overtaking Iran as home to the world’s fourth-largest petroleum deposits.
Iraq’s oil production has risen above 3 million barrels per day for the first time in more than three decades, it announced on Monday, and said it will sharply increase exports with a major new floating oil terminal beginning operations in three days.
Iraq is on its way to raise crude oil production by more than a quarter this year. Iraq is currently the third largest producer of oil in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.
The Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development has commissioned a feasibility study for creating a single energy market from Morocco to Oman, the Italy-based consultancy who will conduct it said on Monday.
The Iraqi Ministry of Oil will open on Sunday the first oil exportation floating port through the Arab Gulf with a capacity of 900,000 b/d, according to a ministry spokesman.
Top oil exporter Saudi Arabia produced around 9.87 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil in January, about 70,000 bpd more than it pumped in December, an industry source familiar with the matter told Reuters on Wednesday.
Iran’s gas pipeline to Iraq has seen a physical progress of 40 percent and will be extended to the Iraqi capital of Baghdad by the Ten-Day Dawn of the next Iranian year (February 1-11, 2013), said oil minister on Saturday.
Jordan said Sunday an attack against a gas pipeline in Egyptian city of Arish led to the complete halt of natural gas supply Jordan receives from the north African country, the state-run Petra news agency reported.
A terrorist group targeted an oil pipeline south of al-Quriye in Deir Ezzor with an explosive device at 3 AM on Saturday, causing a fire at the area of explosion.
Libyan oil production has climbed to 1.3 million barrels per day, the National Oil Corporation (NOC) said in a statement, as companies resume production following the eight-month war.
