Saudi Arabia trimmed its exports, tapering production available to markets by 2.4% – or 237,000 barrels a day – in December, according to latest figures from the International Energy Forum’s Joint Organisation Data Initiative (JODI).
OPEC’s largest crude producer reduced output to 9.81 million barrels a day of crude compared with 10.047 million in November, the data showed, with exports cut from 7.8 million bpd to 7.36 million bpd, including condensates and excluding natural-gas liquids.
Saudi consumed less fuel domestically month-on-month, bucking a trend of consistent demand growth which may one day put severe pressure on Saudi’s ability to respond to international demand, says Jadwa, a Saudi investment bank.
The news follow’s the International Energy Agency’s downgrade of Saudi’s oil production capacity last week. The agency reduced its estimate of Saudi’s total capacity to 11.88 million barrels per day, from the previous estimate of 12 million bpd and some way below Saudi’s estimate of 12.5 million bpd. Saudi’s oil minister Ali al-Naimi said recently that the Kingdom can pump up to 11.4 – 11.8 million bpd rapidly if needed. “All we need is to turn valves,” Naimi told CNN. Naimi is confident Saudi can pump 12.5 million bpd but says it would take up to 90 days for production to reach this level.
With the UAE and Kuwait thought to still be producing at capacity, Saudi is the only oil producer with a significant swing capacity.
Other OPEC producers upped production in December. Nigeria, according Reuters news, increased its exports by eight per cent to 2.27 million barrels a day, benefiting from higher crude oil prices.
Venezuela boosted exports by 18.7 per cent to 1.71 million barrels a day while Iraq increased exports by 0.5 per cent to 2.15 million barrels a day, data the government submitted to the initiative and posted yesterday on its website showed.
Iran, OPEC’s second-largest producer, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, and Libya didn’t submit data for the month.
