Baghdad Bob Re-Emerges

Updates

June 6, 2013:  Investors.com is reporting -- "Fracking: The Death Knell Of OPEC"

If there was any doubt the U.S. shale revolution is breaking the dominance of unsavory energy producers on global oil supplies, look no further than last week's OPEC meeting, where the alarm bells were going off.

At Friday's Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries meeting in Vienna, the mask of non-chalance about America's new fracking energy boom came off.

After years of dismissing U.S. energy production as insignificant and expensive, OPEC suddenly said it would "study" the growth in hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, a deceptively bland response to the biggest challenge the cartel has ever faced on its monopoly.

The statement concealed the anything-but-tranquil tone of the meeting, in which members were attacking each other and warning of a split.

Nigeria Oil Minister Diezani Alison-Madueke declared U.S. shale oil "a grave concern," according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

And the linked article goes on from there.

Original Post

Iraq: shale will have little effect on oil demand from OPEC. Rigzone is reporting:

Rising U.S. shale oil production will have only minimal effect on demand for crude oil from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, meaning most members of the group want to leave their output ceiling unchanged at 30 million barrels a day, said Iraqi Oil Minister Abdul Kareem Luaiby Thursday. 

Iraq will continue to increase its oil production to 3.525 million barrels a day by the end of this year, compared with 3.125 million barrels a day currently, Mr. Luaiby said.

And that is according to Abdul Kareem "Baghdad Bob" Luaiby.

An earlier post links a story suggesting Iraq is on track to double production by 2020 or 2025. I forget which; I think 2020.

Baghdad Bob needs to look at this graph.