Dalga Khatinoglu, Trend Agency's Iran Service Head
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has increased its crude oil production by 400,000 barrels per day (bpd), while OPEC has announced that the demand for OPEC oil has decreased.
In its latest report released on August 10 OPEC put its July output at 30.308 mbpd, which was 97,000 bpd less than the output a month ago. However, it is still 308,000 bpd above the organization's ceiling production.
Saudi Arabia produced around 10 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil in July, up from 9.6 million bpd in June, an industry source told Reuters on August 11.
Saudi Arabia supplied a total of 9.99 million bpd to the domestic and export markets, the report quoted him as saying.
Saudi Arabia supplied around 9.6 million bpd to the market in May and 9.3 million bpd in April.
Two industry sources also told Reuters last month that Saudi Aramco plans to increase capacity at two oilfields by a total of 550,000 barrels per day by 2017 to take strain off the world's largest conventional oilfield.
Iraq and Libya reduced production by 51,000 bpd and 124,000 bpd last month respectively.
Saudi Arabia did not officially report its output amount for July to OPEC, but the Organization has estimated based on secondary sources that the country has increased production by 97,000 bpd month to month in July to 9.7 mbpd.
Saudi Arabia has boosted its crude oil production and is planning to increase its production capacity, while OPEC has reported that the organization's output is currently 400,000 bpd above the global demand.
According to OPEC monthly report published on August 10, the demand for OPEC crude in 2013 is forecast to average 29.9 mbpd, or almost unchanged from the previous report and 0.4 mbpd lower than in the year before. "In 2014, demand for OPEC crude has experienced a slight change since the previous report to stand at 29.7 mbpd. This represents a decline of 0.3 mbpd compared to the year before.According to OPEC report based on secondary resources, Iran's oil output decreased by 8,000 barrels per day in July compared to June. It now stands at 2.684, or 0.95 mbpd less than in 2011.
With regards to halving Iran's oil export during 2012 and continuance of decrease during 2013, Iran consistently requires keeping OPEC ceiling output at 30 mbpd.
According to Iran's yearly budget, the country should sell 1.3 mbpd of crude oil in current solar year, which started on March 20. However, Iran's representative to OPEC told Fars News Agency on August 12 that Iran's crude oil as well as condensate and oil products exports in total reach 1.3 mbps.
Iran's condensate exports had decreased from $12 billion in 2011 to $11 billion in 2012, while official statistics released by Iran's Customs Administration indicate that the country's condensate exports decreased by 15 percent during first four months of current solar year, compared to the same period last year.
Iran exported $2.646 billion worth of condensate (about 0.2 mbpd) from March 20 to July 20.