US major Chevron, which tried to wait out the current dispute between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia that has impacted its onshore operations on the Saudi side of the border in the Neutral Zone, now says the Wafra oil field will remain shut until further notice. The combined shutdown of the 200,000 b/d field and the earlier halt to production ordered by Saudi Arabia at the offshore Khafji oil field has removed 500,000 b/d from the oil market and cut the volume of immediately available global spare production capacity.
Chevron’s Saudi unit informed its Kuwaiti partner in March that it intended to shut down production from the Wafra oil field for two weeks of what appeared to be unscheduled maintenance starting 11 March, apparently in the hope that an ongoing dispute between the two neighbors and allies would be resolved during that time (MEES,15 May). (CONTINUED - 552 WORDS)
