Tag: Venezuela

OPEC Crude Oil Production, What’s Next?

Ron Patterson 337 Comments

The latest OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report is out with OPEC production data for. The data is “Crude Only” and does not reflect condensate production.

Also the charts, except for Libya, are not zero based. I chose to amplify the change rather than the total.

All Data is in thousand barrels per day with the last data point December 2014.

OPEC 12

OPEC 12 production has averaged slightly above or below 30 million barrels per day for about two years now and there is little chance it will go anywhere very fast. But what is obvious from the above chart is there has been no surge in OPEC oil production. OPEC’s December production f 30,204,000 barrels per day is still more than 1.4 million barrels per day below the peaks of 2008 and 2012.

Algeria

 Algeria is struggling to keep production relatively flat. 

Angola

Angola is holding its own… so far.

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Petroleum Supply Monthly & Other News

Ron Patterson 281 Comments

The EIA just released their Petroleum Supply Monthly where they give their estimates of US crude production as well as the crude production for all states and territories through August 2014.

There was not much movement from anyone in August. Here are the biggest movers:

                            Change
Total USA          61 kbd
Texas                  46 kbd
GOM                   21 kbd
North Dakota   18 kbd
Oklahoma         -6 kbd
Colorado            -9 kbd
Alaska              -24 kbd

The data is in kbd with the last data point August 2014.

USA

I have started the data in January 2009 in order to get a better picture of what is really happening.

USA Offshore

 The above chart is the combined production of both GOM and Pacific offshore.

 The EIA is predicting Offshore production to reach 2 million barrels per day by 2016, I really don’t think it is going to make it. They are counting on a lot of new offshore fields that are coming on line to bring it up to that level. While that is happening, what they have underestimated is the very high decline rate of these deep water fields.
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Problems and Politics Keeping Crude Oil Production Well Below Expectations

Ron Patterson 24 Comments

OPEC December Crude Output Falls to 2-Year Low: Survey

Venezuelan Policies

Venezuelan production dropped 235,000 barrels a day to 2.45 million this month, the survey showed. The South American country pumped the least crude since October 2011. Resources have been diverted from energy sector into social welfare programs, sending production lower.

Petroleos de Venezuela SA, the state oil company, was purged after a two-month oil strike intended to oust President Hugo Chavez from power in 2003. Nicolas Maduro, who became president in March when Chavez died, has continued his predecessor’s policies.

“It’s hard to see how the situation in Venezuela gets any better,” said Bill O’Grady, chief market strategist at Confluence Investment Management in St. Louis, which oversees $1.4 billion. “Funds have been used to prop up the government instead of maintaining the oil industry since the PDVSA strike in 2003. It’s clear the country is on an unsustainable path.”

Venezuela

Data for the above graph is from the latest OPEC MOMR published last month and includes data through November 2012. It has Venezuela crude only production at 2,364,000 bp/d in November so it differs considerably from the Bloomberg report above. That report may be using production reported by Venezuela themselves which they reported as 2,854,000 bp/d for November or 490,000 kb/d above what the OPEC MOMR’s “secondary sources” said they produced.

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