Last year’s oil output set world record

Press, 4 January 1980, Page 5

Last year’s oil output set world record

NZPA-Reuter Tulsa, Oklahoma World crude-oil production set a record last year of 22,840 million barrels, despite the shut-down in Iran, the “Oil and Gas Journal” has reported in its annual world-wide issue. Production, which averaged 62.59 million barrels daily, was up 3.7 per cent from 1978. • Production gains in the North Sea, Mexico, and several member nations of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries rose 2.3 per cent'to 30.6 million barrels a day, more than the loss of. 2.1 million barrels a day through the decline in Iranian output, the magazine says. Total non-cpmmuhist production rose 4 per cent to nearly 17,690 M barrels a day, with an average of 48.45 M. Communist gains were re-

ported, but the journal said i ithey were modest compared! iwith gains in recent years. iTctal communist flow averaged 14.14 million barrels a day, up 2.5 per cent. The Soviet ' Union’s increase of 2.1 per cent was the smallest in many years, the. trade magazine reports. China’s production growth rate, estimated at 7.2 pet cent, also slowed, it says. World crude reserves rose slightly,' less than 16 million barrels, to 64,160 million barrels at the end of the year. New discoveries were mostly modest. Gas reserves made a modest gain of 2.8 per cent, despite heavier production in 1979. Refining capacity climbed 1.27 million barrels a day, or 1.3 per cent, to 79.6 million barrels daily, despite depressed demand in some world areas and tight crude supply. The journal reports that the sharp increase in Saudi

'i oil flow, up one million bar--11 rels a day over 1978 to 9.25 million, was the world’s big- ■ gest, and it moved theSaudis into second position, shoving the United States - down to third. • The Soviet Union still is first with an average of , 11.67 million barrels a day, : and Iraq is fourth in world ranking with 3.37 million barrels daily. ‘ Among non-O.P.E.C. producers, the United Kingi dom’s North Sea oil flow ; boosted that country to > twelfth in the standings, compared with sixteenth a year ago. Mexico’s output climbed steadily, reaching 1.6 million barrels a day near the end of the year bn the strength of flow from the Gulf of Campeche and Reforma • fields. I Canadian output reached a midsummer high of 1.5 million barrels a day, and aver-] aged 1.48 million for the year. ■ j