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How Russia Aims to Show OPEC+ Compliance This Quarter

  • Excluding condensate from Russia’s quota agreed in December
  • The country’s oil output hit a post-Soviet record last year
Novatek PJSC exports stabilized condensates from its Yamal LNG project.

Novatek PJSC exports stabilized condensates from its Yamal LNG project.

Photographer: Andrey Rudakov/Bloomberg

For the first time in Russia’s alliance with OPEC, the country is changing the way it makes oil-production cuts.

This quarter, Russia -- one of the architects of the original deal to curb oil output between the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies -- will be allowed to exclude a type of light oil called condensate from the production data it submits to the group. The cartel has always excluded condensates from members’ production volumes, so it was an anomaly for it to be included for the other members of the OPEC+ group.