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Strategies & Market Trends : VOLTAIRE'S PORCH-MODERATED -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sully- who wrote (50447)	4/24/2002 2:33:56 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 65232

EIA Chief Warns OPEC Must Increase Oil Production WASHINGTON, April 23 (Reuters) - OPEC must increase its oil production during the second half of this year in order to avoid a run up in world crude prices, a top U.S. energy official warned Congress on Tuesday. Mary Hutzler, acting head of the Energy Information Administration, told a congressional panel that unless OPEC boosts output world oil markets could see a repeat of 2000 when crude prices rose sharply in the second half of that year before the cartel's large production increases eventually eased prices. "OPEC is now in a situation where world oil markets could tighten and oil prices rise," Hutzler testified at a hearing on current conditions in the U.S. energy market. EIA is the independent analytical arm of the U.S. Energy Department. OPEC Secretary-General Ali Rodriguez said on Tuesday that the cartel did not plan to increase crude production for now. OPEC next meets on June 26. Separately, Hutzler said the temporary loss of Iraq's 1.7 million barrels a day in oil exports can be made up from spare oil production capacity in other OPEC and non-OPEC countries. She said Saudi Arabia in particular could "easily" compensate for Iraq's suspended oil shipments because the kingdom has almost half of OPEC's 6.8 million barrel daily surplus production capacity. Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein on April 8 halted his country's oil exports for 30 days to protest the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Iraq is the sixth biggest oil supplier to the United States. Saudi oil minister Ali al-Naimi said on Monday that his country and OPEC could fill any oil shortfall caused by Iraq. In addition, Hutzler said the recent disruption in Venezuela's oil exports due to a workers strike appears to have had little impact on available U.S. supplies and crude shipments "appeared to be returning to a normal pace." Venezuela is one of the top four oil suppliers to the United States and accounts for about 13 percent of U.S. petroleum imports. (C) Reuters Limited 2002.