The US is set to become the world's biggest oil exporter thanks to the fracking revolution
- US energy production has reached record levels in recent years following a boom in shale production.
- The International Energy Agency's (IEA) latest five-year outlook sees the US overtaking Russia and potentially Saudi Arabia as an oil exporter by 2024.
- "The US has emerged as a major energy exporting country and as such, will be very influential in terms of the flows of trade of energy in the next years to come with several implications for the geopolitics of energy," said Fatih Birol, the IEA's executive director.
The US shale revolution has made it to one of the world's largest energy producers and potentially the largest oil exporter globally within five years.
A five-year outlook from the International Energy Agency (IEA) sees the US potentially overtaking energy giants such as Russia and even Saudi Arabia, the current largest exporter, by 2024.
"The US has emerged as a major energy exporting country and as such, will be very influential in terms of the flows of trade of energy in the next years to come with several implications for the geopolitics of energy," said Fatih Birol, the IEA's executive director.
OPEC-led output cuts have stabilized the energy markets since a drop in prices in October 2018, but markets have remained under pressure from a glut in US supply. For context, until last year, the US was a net importer of energy products.
"The United States will lead oil-supply growth over the next six years, thanks to the incredible strength of its shale industry, triggering a rapid transformation of global oil markets," said the IEA.
The US is set to become a net energy exporter by 2021, with its shale production rising by a record 2.2 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2018. It comes at a time where shale and liquefied natural gas (LNG) is increasingly in demand with Asian countries, particularly China.