It's best to draw out of the OPEC-led effort to balance the market with production cuts during the summer when demand is high, Russia's energy minister said on September 28, 2017.
Russia is a member of a committee monitoring the effort to drain the surplus on the 5-year average of global crude oil inventories and the largest contributor among parties that aren't a member of the OPEC.
Tass reported Monday it was told by a high-ranking source within OPEC the consensus so far was mixed on extending the arrangement by possibly another 6 months, which make be the expiration date into September 2018.
Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak told Austria's Die Presse newspaper it would be better to consider a shorter extension.
«It's better to end the agreement during the growing demand period,» he was quoted as saying.
«It usually takes place in summer. When the demand will grow, everyone should gradually withdraw from the agreement.»
Demand usually softens during the waning months of the year in part because of smaller drains from the transportation sector, which usually draws most from the energy sector.
Novak in May backed the proposal to extend the terms of the original agreement by 3 months into March 2018.
By July, the minister had already declared the multilateral effort a success.
Hundreds of millions of barrels of crude oil are lacking from the global energy market because of the efforts, though investments in the global energy sector are still robust, increasing for the 1st time since 2014, which he said would «help avoid a potential deficit [in oil and petroleum products] in the future.»
