Basra, Nov 07: Iraq expects its southern oilfields to hit pre-war pumping rates of two million barrels per day (bpd) by the end of the year, allowing Baghdad to meet its ‘04 oil export target. Jabbar al-Leaby, head of the South Oil Company (SOC), said that the south’s giant oilfields are now churning out 1.75m bpd — up 200,000 bpd on October — and production is rising steadily. “It should be 1.85 million barrels a day by the end of this month and it could reach two million by the end of this year providing we get the right materials and equipment,” he said. The SOC chief said the south’s main Basra refinery is now running about 180,000 bpd of crude, leaving the remaining oil for sale to international markets. If all goes to plan, Iraq by the end of the month could have some 1.7 million bpd of Basra Light to ship via its Basra Oil Terminal in the Gulf, for now its sole export outlet.
Those figures are good news for state oil marketer SOMO which has planned for oil sales of 1.3 million bpd this month and 1.5 million bpd for December. Baghdad is seeking to maximise production and exports from its southern oilfields, which so far have escaped the sabotage playing havoc with operations in the north — where exports have yet to resume.
Iraqi engineers are rehabilitating the Suba, Luhais, North Rumaila, West Qurna and Majnoon oilfields in the south with the help of US contractor Kellogg Brown and Root, said Leaby. SOMO officials are counting on the extra barrels from those fields to help swell their crude oil contract sales in ‘04. Bureau Report