Oil reaches its peak for 6 weeks, while the U.S. Gulf attacks storm Nicholas

LONDON, Sept. 14 (Reuters) – Oil prices hit a six-week high on Tuesday as Hurricane Nicholas weakened into a tropical storm, threatening widespread flooding and power outages in Texas and Louisiana and, as the International Energy Agency anticipated high bounce demand the rest of the year.

Brent crude rose 44 cents, up 0.6%, to $ 73.95 a barrel at 1114 GMT. West Texas crude (WTI) rose 41 cents, up 0.6 percent to $ 70.86 a barrel.

Both contracts have increased for three consecutive sessions and have been trading near the maximum since early August.

Nicholas is the second major storm to threaten the U.S. Gulf region in recent weeks. Hurricane Ida killed more than two dozen people in August.

Evacuations of offshore oil rigs in the area were carried out on Monday as onshore oil refineries began preparing for Nicholas. Read more

“Significant production disruptions in the Gulf of Mexico continue to be one of the factors driving prices,” Commerzbank said.

About 794,000 barrels a day (bpd), or more than 40 percent of U.S. oil and gas production, went offline Monday, two weeks after Ida sank off the coast of Louisiana, according to regulator offshore Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE). Read more

After three months of falling global oil demand, COVID-19 vaccine launches will restore the appetite for oil that was suppressed by pandemic restrictions, especially in Asia, the International News Agency said on Tuesday. Energy (AIE).

The IEA recorded a rise in demand of 1.6 million bpd in October and continues to grow until the end of the year.

Overall, the agency cut its forecast for global oil demand growth in 2021 by 105,000 bpd to 5.2 million bpd, but raised its 2022 figure by 85,000 bpd to 3.2 million bpd.

These forecasts are much lower than those of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, which sees demand growing by approximately 5.96 million barrels per day this year and 4.15 million per barrel next year. Read more

On Tuesday, protesters blocked the cargo of an oil tanker at the Libyan terminal in Es Sider, the media office of the National Oil Corporation (NOC) and a port engineer reported.

The U.S. government agreed to sell crude from the nation’s emergency reserve to eight companies, including Exxon Mobil (XOM.N) and Chevron (CVX.N), under an auction scheduled to raise money for the federal budget. Read more

Traders noted that the planned release of oil from China’s Strategic Oil Reserves (SPRs) could increase supplies available to the world’s second-largest oil consumer. Read more

Additional reports from Yuka Obayashi in Tokyo; edition by Muralikumar Anantharaman and Jason Neely

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