Kurdistan Region of Iraq plans to increase oil exports through the regional crude oil pipeline to Turkey to 400,000 bpd by the end of the year and 500,000 bpd by the end of Q1 2015
According to the regional Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR), the flow rates through the pipeline to Turkey had increased to 300,000 bpd in the first week of November from 185,000 bpd in August this year.
The Kurdistan Regional Government said that it is currently on track to meet its production target of one million bpd by 2015 or early 2016.
Since January 2014, 34.5mn barrels of oil have been exported from Kurdistan Region of Iraq, of which 21.5mn barrels were sold through the Ceyhan pipeline. The balance was trucked to Mersin in Turkey, the Ministry added.
The exported oil’s value totalled US$2.87bn until now, of which US$2.1bn was received in cash and US$775mn in-kind for 710,000 tonnes of products consisting of kerosene, benzene and diesel.
The revenue accounts for only a fraction of the KRG’s annual entitlement from Iraq’s 2014 budget, suspended by the federal government since January 2014.
Around US$400mn from the cash payments has been used to pay both trucking costs and as part of payment to the oil producers.
