and mainly Saudi Arabia's-readily available capacity which eased the supply shortfalls during the Iranian revolution in 1979, the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990, FSU's production decline in the early nineties, the Venezuelan strikes of 2002, the Iraq war in 2003, intermittent Nigerian civil strife, and the Gulf of Mexico hurricanes in 2005 to name just a few such interruptions. Based on our long experience with global markets and our policy of keeping adequate excess capacity in the range of 1.5- 2 million barrels per day at all times, we have embarked on a program of massive investments estimated at around $18 billion, that will expand crude oil production capacity to reach 12.5 million bpd by 2009. These plans entail bringing on stream increments totaling 2.35 million barrels per day from seven fields. Around 1.5 million barrels per day will be net additions to capacity, 1.1 million bpd of which will be of Arab Light quality while the rest will consist of Arab Extra and Arab Super Light Crudes. The rest of the additions are intended to augment existing capacities including the offsetting of natural decline. In addition to these investments, an estimated $2 billion is spent annually to maintain capacity and offset natural decline. The first increment of this program from the Haradh oil field with a 300 thousands barrelas per day additional capacity was completed earlier this year, while other increments in the Abu Hadriya, Fadhili, Khursaniyah, Shaybah, Nuayyim and Khurais fields are to be completed successively by 2009. Manifa is the latest world-class addition to the crude program and will total about 900 thousand barrels per day of Arabian Heavy capacity when it comes on stream in 2011. Since we started this program the drilling rig count doubled from 55 in 2004 to more than 100 today and will reach 130 by May next year. --More
