America’s oil market supremacy under threat

Official figures show US imports of crude oil increased in the first half of 2016 in what is seen as an early sign that the country’s supremacy in oil production through fracking is now under threat.

Figures released by the US Energy Department show that the country’s imports of crude oil have increased for the first time in six years.  This could be an early sign to show that America’s oil market supremacy brought about by its shale technology is already under threat. 

The figures show that US imports of oil during the first half of 2016 increased by seven percent.  This is the first time the imports saw such uptick since 2010, the US Energy Department announced in a statement released on Friday. 

​"US gross crude oil imports increased by 528,000 barrels per day, or 7 percent, during the first half of 2016 compared to the first half of 2015," read the statement as reported by Sputnik news agency. "This increase reverses a multiyear trend of decreasing US crude oil imports as a result of increasing US production."

Amid the overall rise, there were increased US gross imports of crude from Nigeria, Iraq and other members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

Nevertheless, increased imports from Canada were offset by a decline in imports from Mexico, the statement added.

A significant factor in the increase during the first six months of 2016 was a change in price spreads for crude. It is also expected that the annual US imports of crude for both 2016 and 2017 would increase, the statement concluded.

The US oil and gas production saw a major boom from early 2000s after a new technology called fracking was brought in which combined horizontal drilling with hydraulic fracturing to increase production at not only oil fields but also gas fields. 

The country is today producing nearly nine million barrels per day which is mostly a result of utilizing what is already known as the shale revolution.    

The boom in US oil production led to the saturation of the oil market thus bringing down the prices – what eventually hurt the producers.