Authors libby rittenberg 723

oil, at least in the short term. In the summer of 2005, Peter Maass of The
New York Times reported that Saudi Arabia’s oil minister, Ali al-Naimi, gave
an upbeat report in Washington, D.C. to a group of world oil officials. With
oil prices then around $55 a barrel, he said, “I want to assure you here
today that Saudi Arabia’s reserves are plentiful, and we stand ready to
increase output as the market dictates.” The minister may well have been
speaking in earnest. But, according to the U. S. Energy Information
Administration, Saudi Arabia’s oil production was 9.6 million barrels per
day in 2005. It fell to 8.7 million barrels per day in 2006 and to 8.7 million
barrels per day in 2007. The agency reports that world output also fell in
each of those years. World oil prices soared to $147 per barrel in June of
2008. What happened?
Much of the explanation for the reduction in Saudi Arabia’s output in 2006
and 2007 can be found in one field. More than half of the country’s oil
production comes from the Ghawar field, the most productive oil field in
the world. Ghawar was discovered in 1948 and has provided the bulk of
Saudi Arabia’s oil. It has given the kingdom and the world more than 5
million barrels of oil per day for well over 50 years. It is, however,
beginning to lose pressure. To continue getting oil from it, the Saudis have
begun injecting the field with seawater. That creates new pressure and
allows continued, albeit somewhat reduced, production. Falling production
at Ghawar has been at the heart of Saudi Arabia’s declining output.
The Saudi’s next big hope is an area known as the Khurais complex. An
area about half the size of Connecticut, the Saudis are counting on Khurais
to produce 1.2 million barrels per day beginning in 2009. If it does, it will
be the world’s fourth largest oil field, behind Ghawar and fields in Mexico
and Kuwait. Khurais, however, is no Ghawar. Not only is its expected yield
Attributed to Libby Rittenberg and Timothy Tregarthen
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