Russia (bbabo.net), - Since the beginning of 2021, the OPEC+ oil production cut deal has been overfulfilled, that is, its participants do not choose their quotas to increase production. In December, the level of execution of the transaction was 122%, which means that the market did not receive almost 800 thousand barrels of oil per day from the planned volume.
This is not bad for oil prices, which are growing, but it does not have the best effect on the world economy, accelerating inflation. If only oil rose in price, it would be half the trouble. But against the backdrop of price records for gas, coal and the rising cost of electricity, it's time to talk about a gradually brewing global energy crisis. Expensive raw materials hinder economic growth, but at the same time contribute to an increase in prices for the most necessary goods and services - electricity, heat, products, and equipment.
Rising energy prices are making a significant contribution to overall inflation, Finam analyst Alexander Potavin believes. Basically, an increase in energy prices can affect the cost of socially important, inelastic goods. The expert quotes the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, who said at the end of January that if energy prices remain high throughout 2022, fueling higher inflation, this will seriously affect the recovery of the EU economy after the pandemic.
At the end of January, the OPEC+ countries increased oil production by 210,000 barrels per day instead of 400,000 barrels. Such data was provided by the portal OilPrice.com. There are no official statistics yet. Oil prices are above $90 per barrel, and now they can only be dropped by a new wave of the pandemic and lockdowns or the lifting of US sanctions on Iran. In both cases, the action will be temporary. Demand growth is outpacing supply. Experts see the reasons for this in the scale of the OPEC + deal and in the propaganda of the "green" agenda.
With a sharp decline in production at the beginning of the new deal, OPEC + had to not only postpone plans for new wells or even entire projects, but also mothball existing ones, explains Ekaterina Grushevenko, head of the Decarbonization and Climate Policy direction at the Energy Center of the Moscow School of Management Skolkovo. In her opinion, now this situation has resulted in the fact that producers do not have time to give all the best in drilling and begin to lag behind in production, which is aggravated by the winter period.
Recent years have been characterized by a rather low volume of financial injections into production due to the reorientation of investors to the "green" agenda, Potavin notes. Therefore, only a few can increase the production of hydrocarbon raw materials following the growing demand, the expert clarifies.
Ihsan Haqq, a leading analyst at Oil Research and Forecasts, Refinitiv, agrees that the lack of investment, especially in African and Latin American countries, in recent years has led to the fact that some OPEC + countries cannot produce as much as planned, he notes.
But everyone has problems. In December, Russia fulfilled all its obligations, the level of execution of the deal was almost one hundred percent. But from August to November, our production lagged behind OPEC+'s plans to increase production. Another leader of the deal, Saudi Arabia, has been unable to reach the planned production volumes for 3 months in a row. As a result, already this year the market may experience a significant shortage of oil, which will have the most serious consequences for the entire global economy.
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