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Page added on February 2, 2014
Sorry, Shale. Iraq Is The Real Oil Revolution
After pushing up domestic crude oil production by about three million barrels a day (mb/d) in the United States, shale oil has inspired speculation about radical shifts in the global oil market.
Radical shifts are certainly on the horizon, but something other than shale is likely to be driving them. That something is Iraq.
Iraq is ramping up oil-exports in 2014, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit. The draft budget anticipates average exports of 3.4 mb/d, marking a nearly 30% increase from 2013 export levels.
Considering the political struggle between Baghdad and the semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan, the budget forecast seems bullish but not beyond the realm of possibility. New sources of production in the south are coming on-stream and infrastructure bottlenecks are easing.
Iraq is currently the world’s third-largest oil exporter. and has the resources and plans to increase rapidly its oil and natural gas production as it recovers from three decades punctuated by conflict and instability.
“The emergence of Iraq as an oil power of the nature of Saudi Arabia is the big thing in the future of the oil business,” said Henry Groppe, a seasoned oil and gas analyst from Texas, in an interview on Wednesday with Toronto’s Globe & Mail. “It dwarfs everything else. It’s the thing that everybody ought to be watching and following as closely as possible.” increase of the post Saddam era
Oil exploration efforts in the post Saddam era have suggested that Iraq’s oil resource is much bigger than analysts had previously anticipated.
International oil companies have already secured contracts that imply an epic increase in Iraq’s oil production capacity by 2020.
“Reaching output in excess of 9 mb/d by 2020 would equal the highest sustained growth in the history of the global oil industry,” the International Energy Agency concluded in the 2012 Iraq Energy Outlook.
The barriers to achieving these admittedly ambitious targets are as big as they are diverse, including everything from infrastructure inadequacies and skilled labor shortages to financial risks and lack of security.
While it is questionable whether Iraq will be able to meet this ambitious target, increasing Iraq’s oil production by half of that target would make Iraq the largest contributor to global supply growth over the next 20 years and on course to displacing Russia as the world’s second-largest oil exporter by 2030.
In any scenario, Iraq is the primary force affecting the long-term outlook for oil markets.
“Almost every second barrel of world oil production growth in the next two decades will come from Iraq, with the potential to provide prosperity for all of Iraq’s 32 million people,” said Dr. Fatih Birol, the lead author of the IEA’s report in 2013.
10 Comments on "Sorry, Shale. Iraq Is The Real Oil Revolution"
Davy, Hermann, MO on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 3:08 pm
Mainstream media circle jerkers
FarQ3 on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 3:19 pm
Really! Where have I heard this before?? Oh that’s right the pig told me, the one that flew by in early 2012!
Arthur on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 5:14 pm
Iraq can not be duplicated.
Fracking however started in the US and has the potential to spread all over the planet.
Fracking is the real revolution, not Iraq.
Iraq however will greatly contribute to further pressure on the ‘peak-oil being immanent’ hypothesis and create the illusion of a few more ‘BAU years’.
westexas on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 5:42 pm
Based on 2012 data, Iraq was the world’s fifth largest net oil exporter, not the third largest, as the article claims.
And recent data show a decline in oil exports from 2012 to 2013:
http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=63758
DC on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 7:19 pm
Iraq barely even exists anymore. A weak, US-puppet state that seems to exists more on paper than as a tangible reality. Its oil fields are now controlled by US and other allied corporate oil giants. In the north, the Iraqi govt is hardly acknowledged, in the south most citizens hate and distrust whoever is claiming the govt in Baghdad these days. The infastructure the US dilberately destroyed, has mostly stayed that way, and all its museums and other cultral icons have largely been smashed. IoW, things are as the US corporate mar-mongers intended.
So whenever I heard some 1% hack pseudo-journalist write Iraq is doing X, It comes off as little more than a bad joke, like this article and others similar to it.
Davy, Hermann, MO on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 8:08 pm
DC on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 7:19 pm
Its oil fields are now controlled by US and other allied corporate oil giants
What about your Chinese friends DC? Last I heard they are the major player in Iraq. It is OK for the Chinese to be there right DC. That is because they are model world citizens we all look up to now.
DC on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 8:43 pm
Please link news articles of with a list of nations China has invaded recently, or even no-so-recently for its oil, murdered millions of people, spread DU dust everywhere, burned civilians alive with WP muntions, aided and abetted terrorism. I am pretty sure it was US\UK\Nato bombs and proxy ‘rebels’ that have been destabilizing Sryia, Libya, Lebanon, Iran, and others, and not China.
So yea, I am pretty sure that it wasn’t Chinese bombs and missiles that destroyed water, power, sewer, hospitals, schools and bridges throughout Iraq and other ME nations these last few years. But, hey, I could be wrong, maybe it WAS Chinas air force and cruise missiles. I am pretty sure finding pictures of Chinese planes and helicopter gunships strafing civilians and their laughing about it will be trivial no? Ill wait right here while you pull those up…..
And secondly, what is it that bothers you so much about China being Iraq in the first place? I mean, you do understand Iraqs oil industry USED to be state-owned and sold its oil in EUROS, not dollars AND was free to engage other state-owned oil companies in whatever ventures they wished. Not anymore. So you can drop the Chinese friends snark, they are not my ‘friends’ but I at least, have no trouble recognizing they are not the ones committing war-crimes. Thats would be US and its corporations tyvm.
Davy, Hermann, MO on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 8:53 pm
Talk to the Dali Lama about what he thinks about the Chinese DC? I am not going to deny the US has committed crimes in the Mid East. Pretty plain to see. But maybe you should go back to school on your love of the Chinese!!
Meld on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 10:55 pm
How is all this arguing going to solve anything. Everyone all over the world is arguing over pointless shit whilst the world burns. Get out there, plant some trees, make some cider, go to a barn dance, make love, volunteer with your community, learn to grow food using the least amount of energy as possible. Get out there and have fun ! 😉
Davy, Hermann, MO on Mon, 3rd Feb 2014 1:11 am
Meld on Sun, 2nd Feb 2014 10:55 pm
amen to that!
I just raise hell with people I like