The International Energy Agency is in talks with member countries following last week's OPEC meeting and is "still assessing" the oil market situation before considering any potential response, Executive Director Nobuo Tanaka said Tuesday.
The International Energy Agency is in talks with member countries
following last week's OPEC meeting and is "still assessing" the oil
market situation before considering any potential response, Executive Director
Nobuo Tanaka said Tuesday.
Tanaka reiterated that the IEA "stands ready to act" if the market
requires additional oil. At the same time, Tanaka, whose organization
represents consuming countries, expressed confidence that
Saudi
Arabia
could pump additional oil to
meet supplies, he said in an exclusive interview with Dow Jones Newswires. The
IEA has authority to coordinate an emergency response of oil from its member
governments.
Tanaka's remarks came less than a week after a
Vienna
meeting of the Organization of Oil Exporting Countries concluded in acrimony
after members failed to agree to boost output to meet anticipated demand
growth. The surprising outcome continued to reverberate Tuesday, as OPEC's
Secretary General expressed concerns that oil prices could rise later this
year.
OPEC split last week on whether to boost output by some 1.5 million barrels a
day, a plan favored by
Saudi Arabia
and
some other Gulf producers. Some OPEC members, including
Iran
, were
skeptical additional supplies were needed. The members that fought the increase
have also tended to favor somewhat higher oil prices.
OPEC Secretary General Abdalla Salem Al-Badri, the official spokesman for the
organization, said Tuesday that oil prices "will go up for sure" if
the would rise later this year if the supply gap in many official forecasts
comes to fruition, Reuters reported. The OPEC official was also quoted as
saying high prices will hurt economic growth, Reuters said.
Also Tuesday, EU Energy Commissioner Gunther Oettinger told Dow Jones Newswires
in
Stockholm
that
the European Union plans to discuss oil market issues at a meeting with OPEC in
Vienna
later this month.
"We want to speak (with OPEC) about security of supply for 2011 and 2012
and to speak about what is a feasible price," Oettinger said in an
exclusive interview.
Asked whether he was worried about a high oil price, Oettinger said: "No,
I'm not worried".
Meanwhile, Tanaka said he was confident
Saudi
Arabia
could use its spare
production capacity to put additional oil on the market following the OPEC
meeting.
Saudi Arabia
plans
to immediately boost output to as much as 10 million barrels a day, Gulf
sources have said.
The issue will be "how fast" the Saudis can put additional oil on the
markets, Tanaka added, noting that Saudi domestic oil consumption is expected
to increase during the summer.
Tanaka later told the audience that the at the IEA, "we stand ready to take
all our options." But Tanaka said the IEA would tap emergency supplies
only after a "disruption" such as if
Saudi
Arabia
and other OPEC members were
unable to pump more oil. He said some of the current anxieties were reminiscent
of the oil market in 2008.
The IEA warned on May 19 that it was prepared to "consider using all
tools" if OPEC failed to boost output, a statement that was seen by
producers as a veiled threat that the IEA would tap strategic supplies if OPEC
didn't pump more oil.
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