The OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report (MOMR) for December 2024 was published recently. The last month reported in most of the OPEC charts that follow is November 2024 and output reported for OPEC nations is crude oil output in thousands of barrels per day (kb/d). In the OPEC charts below the blue line with markers is monthly output and the thin red line is the centered twelve month average (CTMA) output.
Output for October 2024 was revised higher by 19 kb/d and September 2024 output was revised higher by 25 kb/d compared to last month’s report. OPEC 12 output increased by 104 kb/d with most of the increase from Libya (141 kb/d.) Iran also increased by 37 kb/d while Iraq saw a decrease of 45 kb/d. Other OPEC members had small increases or decreases of 20 kb/d or less.
The chart above shows output from the Big 4 OPEC producers that are subject to output quotas (Saudi Arabia, UAE, Iraq, and Kuwait.) After the pandemic, Big 4 average output peaked in 2022 at a centered 12 month average (CTMA) of 20849 kb/d, crude output has been cut by 2477 kb/d relative to the 2022 CTMA peak to 18372 kb/d in November 2024. The Big 4 may have roughly 2477 kb/d of spare capacity when World demand calls for an increase in output.
Most of the increase in the Other 8 OPEC nations (those OPEC 12 nations that are not part of the Big 4) came from Iran and Venezuela (about 400 of the 469 kb/d average annual increase), with the remaining 6 nations that were subject to quotas having relatively flat output over the 37 month period covered in the chart above (November 2021 to November 2024) . See chart below for OPEC Other 6 (OPEC 12 minus Big 4 minus Iran minus Venezuela) with an average annual increase of only 69 kb/d over past 3 years.
OECD Commercial petroleum stocks are near the bottom of the 5 year range from 2019 to 2023, so far the market seems to need less oil than earlier periods as oil prices remain relatively low.
OPEC has reduced its estimate for World liquids demand growth in 2024 by 200 kb/d compared to last month’s oil report, but the expected growth in 2025 is unchanged.
The chart above is included to show that demand for crude oil (input of crude to refineries constitutes most of crude oil demand) has actually decreased from 80.8 Mb/d in 2023 to 80.54 Mb/d in 2024, a decrease of 260 kb/d. So the petroleum liquids demand increase of 1600 kb/d in 2024, plus the 260 kb/d crude demand decrease would suggest NGL and other liquids demand increased by 1860 kb/d in 2024. Recent levels of output for non-crude liquids is around 25 Mb/d, so this would be a 7.4% increase in non-crude liquids demand, if both World liquids demand estimate and the refinery throughput estimates by OPEC are correct. I expect OPEC will eventually revise its demand estimate lower to match reality.
The tight oil estimate for 2023 was revised higher by 30 kb/d compared to last month’s report, the 2024 tight oil output estimate is unchanged so that growth is 30 kb/d lower than last month, tight oil growth in 2025 was also revised lower by 20 kb/d compared to last month.
My best guess tight oil estimate for the US has been revised from what I reported last month, primarily due to new estimates for the Permian basin based on regional output data for the Permian based on Texas RRC data, New Mexico OCD data and EIA estimates for Texas and New Mexico, along with rig counts from Baker Hughes. The peak is 9644 kb/d in 2026 for this scenario compared to a 2024 peak at 8810 kb/d in the scenario presented last month.
The World C+C estimate gets revised when using this updated tight oil scenario as in the chart above with a peak at 83.7 Mb/d in 2028 and a URR of 2760 Gb (2658 Gb produced by 2100). For those who understand that climate change may be an existential environmental crisis, the scenario above would be considered pessimistic. An optimist might believe there is less crude oil that will be extracted, but I believe that is wishful thinking. I hope I am wrong, but think I am not.
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Gas-Prices/Gas-Car-Ban-Hinges-on-Upcoming-EPA-and-Supreme-Court-Decisions.html
Click link for entire piece above, excerpt below:
The Biden administration is expected to permit the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to grant permission to 12 states, including California, this month to ban the sale of new gasoline-powered cars by 2035. If the move goes ahead, it would be one of the most ambitious U.S. climate policies to date, alongside the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). However, President-elect Donald Trump could revoke this permission once he takes office, which falls in line with his plans to reduce the reach of the IRA and other climate policies.
…
On 13th December, the U.S. Supreme Court said it would consider whether business groups be permitted to challenge the EPA’s waiver programme for California. The groups, which include fuel producers and sellers, told the court that its intervention was required to prevent the Golden State from effectively setting national policy. “Without this court’s immediate review… California’s unlawful standards will continue to dictate the composition of the nation’s automobile market,” they stated in their petition seeking review. Decisions from both the Supreme Court and the Biden administration will determine the legality of the EPA waivers and will decide whether the gasoline car ban will go ahead in 12 states.
Novi labs has now taken down any free data access on their blog that used to be provided when Enno Peters was there. So we are now flying blind.
Oh oh, must have insulted the Novi Labs execs somehow.
Tangentially related note. This FT article claims that the Australia Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) stopped their El Nino forecast web page because it was essentially ineffective
https://www.ft.com/content/4c5da16b-e85e-4828-8f07-873c229aaa3c
Information is apparently dangerous. Ask the Italian seismologists who have gotten sued.
I doubt they care too much about POB. They’re not scared of it. You overdramatize the importance of peak oil commentary. Just like nobody in real oil and gas academics cares about the fringe, lower tier publications from the “shock model”. It’s not even on anyone’s radar.
The evolution of SP is more the natural progression of things, given that SP developed into a (part of) a real money making company with real money paying customers and real employees that they need to pay real salaries to so they can buy real roasts for real Xmas dinner that real wives and real kids eat. SP is not an ad hoc peak oil speculation analysis tool any more.
If you want access to the dashboards, I’m sure they will sell you a license. I don’t think they are scared of the blog posts you post from using it. It’s just you need to pay.
how much does access to the date you need cost?
Dennis,
Thanks for the report much appreciated.
I wrote another program which creates peak oil scenarios based on an input of the max growth rate and max decline rate, which then spits out a random number between the given inputs for every year until oil production essentially hits < 1 billion barrels per year.
This is a scenario which max oil growth rate is 1.5% and max decline rate is -5%.
URR for such an input is usually ~2700Gb to 3200Gb +/- 10%.
I don't see such scenarios as realistic. Because for some reason I just don't see oil being produced past this century. So any logarithmic decline in oil production is unrealistic in my view. I think the way it begun is the way it will likely end abruptly. But bear in mind i am probably wrong.
Thanks Iron Mike,
Forecasts beyond 2050 are very likely to be wrong, on that we probably agree. In my mind it will be difficult to eliminate petrochemical demand for oil along with oil use for air and water transportation and shipping. I expect there will be some demand for these beyond 2100. My scenario presented above has about 2660 Gb of cumulative output up to 2100 and another 100 Gb after that (decline rate at around 3% per year on average from 2100 to 2300.)
““I told the European Union that they must make up their tremendous deficit with the United States by the large scale purchase of our oil and gas,” Trump posted on the social media platform Truth Social.
“Otherwise, it is TARIFFS all the way!!!”
Draw your own conclusions.
He posts this stuff in the middle of the night. I’m guessing during working hours Moscow time.
It’s worth remembering that the United States entered WWI and WWII to uphold free trade.
Also it’s worth remembering that the Cold War was a standoff with proxy wars between two blocks. Ultimately the smaller trading block went into (comparative) decline. Putin is aware of this which is why he sends his minions out to undermine free trade.
I find more an more curios that the OPEC data appears faster and faster and US data appears slower and slower. Maybe it is just me!