Speaking at the Russian Energy Week Forum on Thursday, 14 October 2021, the Deputy Minister of Russia who is also in charge of leading Russia’s participation in the OPEC+ agreement, Alexander Novak, said although the country can produce up to 11.4 million bpd, it is currently pumping 9.9 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil in line with the OPEC+ deal.

He noted that Russia has previously attained a maximum output of 11.3 million bpd-11.4 million bpd and that increasing output to that level is not an issue. However, the situation on the oil market must be considered, according to Novak.

According to him, existing oil prices and the supply-demand balance sufficiently represent the reality, and Russia does not foresee major volatility in the oil market soon.

Russian officials, including Novak, have stated in recent months that they expect crude oil and condensate production to return to pre-pandemic levels by May 2022.

According to the most recent OPEC+ quota distribution, Russia, the pact’s non-OPEC leader, has a ceiling of 9.913 million bpd for November, the same as OPEC’s de facto leader and top producer, Saudi Arabia.

Official Russian data does not distinguish between crude oil and condensate production, making Russia’s crude oil production more difficult to estimate than the output levels of the other OPEC+ members. However, condensates are excluded from Russia’s OPEC+ quota.

According to Bloomberg, Russian crude and condensate production was 10.7 million barrels per day in September. According to Bloomberg calculations, if condensate production was about 880,000 bpd, Russian crude oil output would be 9.83 million bpd or 130,000 bpd above quota.