Washington – Domestic oil production and refinery output should return to pre-hurricane levels by November, the Energy Department said Wednesday, as repairs are made to damaged oil rigs and Gulf Coast refineries.
The department’s statistical agency, the Energy Information Administration, said the recovery could vary somewhat, depending on the pace of repairs to facilities damaged by Hurricane Katrina.
It also said consumers may see an increase in the cost of heating fuels this fall. In the report, the agency said natural gas prices for the Midwest will increase as much as 71 percent, while heating oil prices in the Northeast will rise 31 percent.
Electricity prices in the South are expected to jump 17 percent.
But barring an unusually slow pace of repairs, the agency said, domestic oil production should return to just under 5.4 million barrels a day in November, the level it was in August before Katrina disrupted most of the Gulf production and knocked out 10 Gulf Coast refineries.
The Energy Information Administration said U.S. refining capacity also should rebound, with an anticipated output of gasoline and other fuels of nearly 16.4 million barrels a day in November, the same as the August levels.
Even in a slow recovery scenario a “return to normal operations … is (expected to be) achieved or nearly achieved by December,” said the agency in a report issued Wednesday.
Agency director Guy Caruso, testifying before a House committee examining the energy impacts of Hurricane Katrina, said the forecast will depend on the timing and pace of repairs to oil platforms and refineries.
But he added, “The infrastructure has been coming back more quickly” than had been expected.
