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Bloomberg
Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest crude exporter, awarded $18 billion in contracts to boost output capacity at two offshore oil fields even as the kingdom and its Opec partners restrict production.
Saudi Arabia’s state oil company will add a combined 550,000 barrels a day of crude-production capacity at its Marjan and Berri fields, it said on Tuesday in a statement.
It will raise capacity for natural gas output at the deposits by 2.5 billion standard cubic feet a day. Aramco awarded 34 contracts, with half of them going
to Saudi firms, according to the statement.
Aramco, known officially as Saudi Arabian Oil Co., plans to bring about 1 million barrels a day of oil capacity online by 2023 in order to compensate for reductions at some other fields. Aramco plans to maintain production capacity of 12 million barrels a day even though it regularly pumps about 10 million barrels daily.
Saudi Arabia, with the world’s biggest reserves of conventional crude, has long drawn on its prolific deposits to help balance global oil markets. Riyadh seeks to keep some spare capacity ready and available for rapid use in order to respond quickly to any shortages. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies including Russia have agreed to extend production cuts into 2020 to try to prop up prices amid surging US supplies.