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Gold/Mining/Energy : Strictly: Drilling and oil-field services -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: excardog who wrote (87313)	2/15/2001 4:19:51 PM
From: Tomas	Respond to of 95453

"OPEC has done an excellent job of managing the market by saying what it is going to do..." Experts forecast boom in North Sea oil industry The Scotsman, February 15 BY JEREMY CRESSWELL GLOBAL exploration and production of oil and gas will boom for at least the next two years, according to the respected experts World Oil. But the Houston-based oilfield journals group said the mature North Sea will trail behind emerging areas like West Africa and deepwater Gulf of Mexico in terms of attracting investment. Thomas Wright, director of World Oil said yesterday during a visit to Aberdeen that he agreed with the growing opinion that exploration and production spending would rise 20 per cent to $113.5 billion this year, but then added that a further 20 per cent was on the cards for 2002. He stated that much of the massive investment would be concentrated into the hands of just six companies, notably super-giants BP, Shell, ExxonMobil and TotalFinaElf. However, he warned that this was contingent upon sufficient resources becoming available, meaning money, personnel, equipment and viable prospects in which to hunt for fresh reserves. The continuing boom also hinged on the OPEC continuing to successfully manage global oil supply and demand through cutting or raising member quotas. Wright gave credit to OPEC for dragging the world oil and gas industry out of the late 1997 through early 1999 slump, unlike Royal Bank of Scotland economist Stephen Boyle who is deeply critical of the cartel's efforts to manage crude prices. "OPEC has done an excellent job of managing the market by saying what it is going to do," said Wright, adding that what really happened was somewhat different and yet the system seemed to work. The latest cut in cartel production of 1.5 million barrels of oil per day, implemented on 1 February, in reality added up to just 400,000 bpd as, with the exception of Saudi Arabia, most member countries were already failing to meet previously higher quotas. "The net effect is that the market is being fine tuned," added Wright, who is one of the top team at World Oil, arguably the most respected oilfield publishing house anywhere. He warned price spikes above $30 could be expected. The world's oil producers faced the challenge of keeping up with expected increases in demand. While there was some scope in the system to cope with a small rise, it was very tight. "The new challenge will be to deal with the strains of high capacity utilisation," added Wright.