Middle East war has created largest oil supply disruption in world history: IEA
Global supply is expected to drop by eight million barrels per day in March due to the blocking of the Strait of Hormuz.
The war in the Middle East is creating the biggest oil supply disruption in history, the International Energy Agency said on Thursday, a day after the agency agreed to release a record volume of oil from strategic stockpiles.
Global supply is expected to drop by 8 million barrels per day in March due to the blocking of the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow channel along the Iranian coast, since the US and Israel began air strikes on Iran on February 28.
Middle East Gulf countries have cut total oil production by at least 10 million bpd — a volume equal to almost 10 percent of world demand — as a result of the conflict, the IEA said in its latest monthly oil market report, adding that without a rapid restart of shipping flows these losses were set to increase.
"Shut-in upstream production will take weeks and, in some cases, months to return to pre-crisis levels depending on the degree of field complexity and the timing for workers, equipment and resources to return to the region," the agency said.