Drilling News Forecast: Iraqi 2022 output recovered to nearly pre-pandemic levels, but OPEC-plus policy and infrastructure constraints could keep Iraq from making further production gains in the new year.

Iraq produced 4.62 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil in December, taking the nationwide average for the year to 4.61 million bpd, according to a field-by-field count by Iraq Oil Report.

This was a significant increase over the 2021 average of 4.198 million bpd, when Iraq had to comply with steep OPEC-plus output cuts introduced in 2020 after prices and demand plummeted during the Coronavirus pandemic.

Production recovered steadily in the first half of 2022 as the OPEC-plus alliance loosened its restrictions, but weakening prices mid-year caused the 23-nation group to reduce its collective quota by 2 million bpd from November, which forced Iraq to throttle back production from the peak of 4.74 million bpd it achieved in August and September.

Drilling News.