There is no shortage of crude in the global oil market, Qatar's Oil Minister Abdullah al-Attiyah said on Monday. Oil prices of around $85 a barrel were not related to supply and demand fundamentals, he told reporters after the inauguration of an aluminium plant in Qatar. Global oil inventories were high, indicating supply was sufficient, he added.
The oil price is above the $75 to $80 a barrel that the king of top exporter Saudi Arabia said was fair late last year. Other Opec members have also said a price around that level was good for both consumers and producers. Oil has traded mostly above $80 since early March. Still, Opec had no plans for now to call an extraordinary meeting before the next scheduled gathering in October, Attiyah said.
The producer group kept output targets unchanged at a meeting last month, and has made no changes in supply policy since late 2008. Qatar had held no talks with other major gas producers about cutting gas output, Attiyah said. "No-one is discussing it with me," he said. Algerian Energy Minister Chakib Khelil said last month he would ask other gas producers to reduce supply sold on spot physical markets.
Attiyah said on Monday that most of Qatar's supply was on long-term contracts, rather than sold into spot markets. Khelil plans to test the will of other members of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) on cutting gas supply at a meeting on April 19 in Algeria. Opec oil producers Qatar and Algeria are members of the GECF, a loose grouping of gas suppliers that has, to date, made no attempt to co-ordinate supply policy.
Qatar Petroleum (QP) and Norsk Hydro had no definitive plans yet to expand their Qatalum aluminium joint venture, Attiyah said. QP and Hydro inaugurated the plant, which started production in late 2009, on Monday. They are planning to increase the production capacity at the 585,000 tonne-per-year plant at some point in the future, Attiyah said. The plant is the first primary aluminium smelter in the Gulf Arab state.
"Now we can say the state of Qatar is a major player in terms of the aluminium industry," Attiyah said. QP and Hydro have yet to decide if they would make an initial public offering of shares in the plant, Attiyah said. Qatar hoped the $5.7 billion plant in the industrial city of Mesaieed would stimulate further industrial development, as well as the growth of small and medium enterprises, said Abdulla Salatt, chairman of the Qatalum board of directors.