Oil prices soar again
World oil prices rebounded strongly Thursday as a fire struck a Canadian pipeline sending crude to the United States, the world's biggest consumer of energy.
Oil futures had tumbled Wednesday on a smaller-than-expected decline in US energy reserves and ahead of next week's OPEC output meeting.
Approaching midday trade, New York's main contract, light sweet crude for January delivery, was up a massive 3.45 dollars at 94.07 dollars a barrel.
Brent North Sea crude for January surged 2.14 dollars to 91.95 dollars.
Enbridge Inc said late Wednesday that an explosion in the northern US state of Minnesota forced the company to shut down four pipelines.
Enbridge's oil pipeline system serves major refineries in Canada's Ontario province as well as the Great Lakes region of the United States, delivering about 2.2 million barrels per day.
"News of an explosion at the Enbridge Minnesota terminal will resurrect supply concerns," said Bank of Ireland analyst Paul Harris.
In Paris, the head of the International Energy Agency, Nobuo Tanaka, said the IEA was closely "monitoring" the situation but described the incident as "not substanial."
Nevertheless, he added, "if necessary we will use our emergency measures."
Oil prices had Wednesday closed down more than three dollars in New York owing to the latest data on US energy inventories.
The US Department of Energy (DoE) said US crude inventories had fallen by 400,000 barrels in the week to November 23. Analysts had forecast a drop of 1.0 million barrels.
Meanwhile stocks of distillates, which include heating fuel, shed only 100,000 barrels last week. The market forecast had been for a drop of 1.2 million.
Distillate stocks are being closely watched in the run-up to the northern hemisphere winter, when demand for heating fuel tends to soar.
The DoE added that US refinery usage jumped to 89.4 percent of capacity, up 2.4 percentage points compared with a week earlier.
IEA HEAD APPEALS FOR
MORE OPEC OUTPUT
Another report from Paris adds: The head of the International Energy Agency appealed to Opec on Thursday to increase its oil output at a ministerial meeting next week.
"Some additional production is necessary," IEA executive director Nobuo Tanaka told a press conference here.
Tanaka, whose agency seeks to coordinate the energy policies of some of the world's leading industrialised nations, did not say how much more oil would be needed on the market to stabilise prices.
But the IEA in a report November 13 suggested that an additional 900,000 barrels a day would be needed from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries in the fourth quarter.
The IEA also said that surging oil prices, which at the time of publication were close to 100 dollars a barrel, had begun to depress demand.
Meanwhile the United Arab Emirates (UAE), which is home to 8.1 percent of the world's oil reserve, will make huge investments to boost its oil production capacity, according to a feature report.
Apart from oil, the UAE has an estimated gas reserve of six trillion cubic metres. UAE's current oil output stands at 2.7 million barrels per day, while its gas output is at 65 billion cubic metres per annum.
UAE's oil output is expected to rise to 3.5 million barrels per day at the beginning of next decade. Its oil refinery capacity, which currently stands at 6,00,000 barrels per day, is also expected to rise to 1.1 million barrels per day in the near future, said a report by the official Emirates news agency (WAM).
The Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) has chalked out a plan to increase its crude oil output despite the fluctuation on the world oil market demand for oil continues to rise.
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