30 April 2017, 1:51pm EEST
Salma El Wardany
- OPEC member pumping more than 700,000 barrels a day: Alaokali
- Biggest field Sharara at 216,400 barrels daily after restart
Libya’s crude production rebounded to more than 700,000 barrels a day as the OPEC member’s biggest oil field and another deposit in its western region resumed pumping after a halt.
The Sharara field is currently producing 216,400 barrels a day, while the El Feel, or Elephant, deposit is pumping 26,500 and is expected to boost output further, Jadalla Alaokali, a board member at the National Oil Corp., said Sunday by phone. Crude from Sharara started flowing to the Zawiya refinery after the port of Zawiya re-opened last week following a three-week closure. El Feel, idled since April 2015, also restarted last week.
Dec. 18, 2016 2:19 p.m.
BENOIT FAUCON and HASSAN MORAJEA
Opposition from local militia led to risk of a blockade, oil official says
Libya’s National Oil Co. has for now stopped the relaunch of production at oil fields in the country’s west, Libyan officials said Sunday, after a militia threatened to block the petroleum from reaching the market.
The aborted restart is a blow for Libya’s oil industry, which has been counting on the country’s big western fields to kick-start its comeback. A pipeline that can transport over 400,000 barrels a day from two western fields had partly reopened on Wednesday, but efforts to send that oil to coastal ports are now off, oil officials said.
Oil traders are closely watching Libyan output. The country is a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, but it was exempted from the cartel’s recent deal to cut production because its output has been disrupted in recent years, falling to less than 300,000 barrels a day at times this year, compared with its height of over 1.6 million barrels a day during dictator Moammar Gadhafi’s reign.
Tripoli, 14 December 2016
By Libya Herald reporters
Libyan oil output could approach a million barrels a day if the blockade of a key western pipeline is lifted as reported today.
Protestors, who in 2014 closed the pipelines at Riyayna which run from the Sharara and El-Fil (Elephant) oilfields to the coast, have announced they will reopen the taps tomorrow.
Potentially this could deliver some 365,000 barrels per day of extra production. When added to the existing 600,000 bpd, year-end output could exceed the 800,000 bpd target set by National Oil Corporation chief Mustafa Sanalla in October.
However even if the Petroleum Facilities Guard unit that has mounted the blockade honours its promise, it will not in fact simply be a matter of turning on a tap. Pipeline maintenance and restoring production at oil fields shut in for more two years will not be an overnight operation.
The statement announcing the blockade’s end said “The National Oil Corporation should start its work as soon as possible and we, as the Petroleum Facilities Guard, pledge to protect and defend the wealth of the Libyan state”.
11/23/2016
LONDON -- Wood Mackenzie's latest study on Libya's oil production shows the country's output has doubled from 300,000 bopd in early September to close to 600,000 bopd today, adding to the global oil supply glut.
Although an OPEC member, Libya's output has fallen so drastically it won't be bound by any production restrictions. The country will seek to recover its lost market share, notably in southern Europe where refineries prize its light, sweet blends.
"Libya's oil production increases have occurred despite the absence of a political agreement between competing administrations, and an ongoing security vacuum," said Martijn Murphy, research manager at Wood Mackenzie.
