Iraq is in discussions with OPEC to review its oil production quota as output capacity rises, Hayan Abdul Ghani, the Oil Minister of OPEC’s second largest producer, said on Monday.
Iraq is in talks with OPEC to reassess its production quota within the country’s available production capacity of 5.5 million barrels per day (bpd), Reuters quoted Abdul Ghani as saying at an oil conference today.
Iraq has a current quota of 4.4 million bpd and is committed to sticking to it despite its larger production capacity, the minister said.
Total crude oil exports from OPEC’s second-biggest producer are about 3.6 million bpd now, according to Abdul Ghani.
Despite the 4.4-million-bpd quota, Iraq currently produces lower volumes and is not boosting production as much as it would have been entitled to in the OPEC deal, if it had complied with its quota in the past few years.
Iraq, alongside Kazakhstan and Russia, regularly busted the OPEC quota and is now committed to a compensation plan to pump over 100,000 bpd less than its quota until June 2026, to offset previous overproduction.
Earlier this month, Abdul Ghani said that Iraq plans to increase its oil production capacity to 5.5 million bpd by the end of the year.
“The plan is to reach sustainable production capacity this year at a rate of 5.5 million barrels per day through expansion in well drilling and rehabilitation operations, building surface facilities and pipelines, and increasing water injection to maintain reservoir pressure,” Abdul Ghani told the Rudaw news outlet in early October.
Iraq plans further production capacity increases to have its output capacity at above 6 million bpd by 2029.
In August, Chevron and the Iraqi Oil Ministry signed preliminary exploration agreements that marked a major step toward reviving the U.S. supermajor’s presence in Iraq after years of limited engagement.
Iraq has also restarted exports from its northern semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan via pipeline to the Turkish Mediterranean coast, with current exports at about 200,000 bpd.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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