Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Nuaimi has said an output hike of 500,000 barrels per day (bpd) at Opec's upcoming meeting was "taken for granted," Al-Arabiya television reported Saturday. The news channel said Nuaimi made the statement to its correspondent in Norway during a visit to Oslo for talks with his Norwegian counterpart. Al-Arabiya gave no further details, but the remark attributed to Nuaimi is in line with statements made by Opec's president ahead of the cartel's June 15 meeting in Vienna.
Sheikh Ahmed Fahd al-Sabah, who is also Kuwait's energy minister, said on Tuesday he would propose a 500,000 bpd hike in the cartel's output ceiling if prices remained at current high levels.
However, he said the proposed rise would not add to Opec's current actual production because "I think the real production is already in the market.
"Our real production now is over 30 million bpd for the Opec-11 (including Iraq) We are already over the ceiling."
He said the cartel's actual output excluding Iraq was more than 28 million bpd.
The organisation agreed in March in the Iranian city of Isfahan to an official fixed ceiling of 27.5 million bpd for the Opec-10. But the cartel minus Iraq actually pumped 28.2 million bpd on average in May, up 100,000 bpd from April's 28.1 million bpd, energy information publisher Platts estimated Thursday.
Oil prices dipped on Friday as fears of the potential impact of a tropical storm on production facilities in the Gulf of Mexico abated.
New York's main contract, light sweet crude for July delivery, eased 74 cents to close at 53.54 dollars a barrel. In London, the price of Brent North Sea crude oil for July lost 1.15 dollars to end at 52.67 dollars a barrel.
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