BAGHDAD, March 24 (UPI) -- Oil and natural gas deals with international companies gives Iraq a bright outlook in terms of production, though one analyst expressed doubts.
Iraqi Oil Minister Abdul Kareem al-Luaibi unveiled a plan that he said would increase crude production in Iraq from 2.6 million barrels per day to nearly 6.5 million bpd by the end of 2014, The Wall Street Journal reports.
Iraq sits on at least 140 billion barrels of oil and much of the country remains unexplored. Luaibi's plan is centered on 15 oil and gas deals that Iraq signed with international energy companies during the past year and a half.
"We are hoping to (eventually) reach a production target of 11.5 million barrels a day from these deals," the oil minister was quoted as saying.
Jean-Luc Amos, an energy analyst at London's KBC Energy Economics, told the Journal that Iraq's oil ambitions are a bit too optimistic, however.
"The figure 6.5 million barrels a day to be reached in 2014 is too ambitious," he said. "The more realistic dates for achieving that figure would be between 2015 and 2020."
Luaibi said the Oil Ministry was working on plans to expand export facilities, which so far can't handle his plans for crude oil exports.
