“The United States continued its “relentless rise” in crude oil production in 2013, exceeding even the most bullish of expectations, the International Energy Agency (IEA) reported on Tuesday.
As the U.S. looks toward a future of energy independence, the IEA noted that U.S. crude output for 2013 outstripped its projections from a year ago by around 455 kb/d, and noted that “U.S. crude oil supply in 2013 registered the fastest absolute annual supply growth of any country in the last two decades, rising 15 percent in 2013.”
(Read more: Exporting oil a good idea? Not everyone thinks so)
This helped blunt the impact of supply declines elsewhere, notably Libya and Iran,
The findings from the IEA mirror those of the Energy Information Administration (EIA) in December, when the organization said that the U.S. will continue to produce copious amounts of oil and natural gas through at least 2016, with natural gas production likely to spike for the next two decades at a minimum.
Many experts now forecast the U.S. becoming completely energy independent by 2020…”
