Oil prices broke above $55 a barrel on Tuesday as concern lingered over thin world heating oil supplies ahead of the northern winter. U.S. light crude for December settled at $55.17 a barrel, up 63 cents on the day, while Brent crude in London rose 78 cents to close at $51.56 a barrel. U.S. crude surged to a record $55.67 on Monday after a Norwegian shipowners' group briefly threatened to shut down the country's output to resolve a deadlocked strike, but recoiled after the government stepped in to end the dispute. Norway is the world's third largest oil exporter, and a halt in shipments would have stretched world supply to the limit ahead of the Northern Hemisphere winter when heating demand picks up pace. "The system has insufficient spare capacity to be shock proof," said Jeroen van der Veer, chairman of oil giant Royal Dutch/Shell at the Oil and Money conference in London. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries has been pumping at nearly full throttle since the summer to meet the biggest annual leap in demand for a generation. --More 0103 Local Time 2203 GMT
