In February 2019, the latest official data available by the US Energy Information Administration, pegged Iraqi oil imports to the United States at 11.828 million, or about 422,000 bpd. Venezuela’s imports to the US had already fallen significantly by February, at 6.7 million barrels for the month, or 239,000 bpd. Nigeria and Angola, too, are increasing their shipments to the US in May as well, at a combined 420,000 bpd, according to Refinitiv data, up from 19,000 bpd in February and up from 182,600 bpd in January. Venezuela’s oil production shortcomings have changed the face of US oil imports, causing refineries that had previously relied on the heavy crude to shop elsewhere for similar-grade crude—refiners such as Citgo, Valero, and Chevron. For Venezuela’s customers other than the United States, like India and China, US sanctions on Iran squeezed them even further. Already in March, shipments of Venezuela oil to India in April fell, and now India will even more strapped as its Iranian oil source is off the table as of last week when the waiver it had been given expired. Iran has not minced words when it comes to the notion of OPEC members picking up the slack where oil is concerned. Iran last week made bold claims that Saudi Arabia and UAE will “draw the death and collapse of OPEC” should they fill the void left by Iranian oil barrels being restricted in the market, chastising OPEC members who wielded oil as a weapon.
Suck ‘em dry.
We should have taken Iraqi oil.
Probably also an attempt to keep our oil prices down.
it truly amazes me there is that much oil in the ground. It also bolsters my life long opinion that Oil is not a fossil fuel. id say its ground water thats cooked deep in the earths crust with gases and other elements as a stew and forms the oil. theres no way this amount of oil is just been sitting there for 100 million years. if it was, it would have been depleted 30 years ago on consumption averages world wide over the years...
Related:
https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/report/us_oil.php
US production continuing to increase nicely, but, the big drops in Iranian & Venezuelan exports are a major factor on the world market. Russia’s output is dropping too (OPEC agreement).
Let’s hope Iran gets even more PO’d at Saudi. The two are political and religious enemies: If that were to carry over (more than it does already) to oil, OPEC might be crippled for good.
To those not familiar with the details, note that almost but not quite directly stated in the original excerpt is that TYPES of crude oil matter: Some US refineries are geared toward certain types of crude, and that’s not always an easy thing to change. So, even if (when!) the US becomes overall “crude independent”, a short US supply of a certain type of crude might still result in import of such.