How OPEC Is Helping U.S. Oil Reach a Tipping Point

Quick read here but a good one.  The subtext is that US production keeps exceeding expectations.

Soaring U.S. production, driven by the extraction of oil from shale, has transformed the country’s prospects. Two years ago, when the EIA first started publishing its detailed forecast for 2018, it saw U.S. output ending the year at 9.44 million barrels a day. It now sees last month’s figures at a staggering 11.8 million.

Its most recent forecast shows the growth trend slowing for much of 2019, before picking up again in 2020, following the expected start-up of new pipelines to carry oil from the Permian Basin to the Gulf coast in the second half of this year. A similar pause in growth was forecast for the summer of 2018, but it didn’t materialize. The EIA has consistently underestimated the U.S. production rate, and could do so again.