The geopolitics of Oil Production (1900-2025)

The attached graph shows the global oil production since 1900.

The blue line shows that the US started the 20th century producing no oil, but rapidly expanded production through industrialization.

By the 1920s-1930s, the US was the world's dominant producer, reaching approximately 4,000-5,000 TWh and its production peaked in the early 1970s at around 6,000-6,500 TWh.

After the 1970s peak, US production entered a steady, decades-long decline, dropping to around 3,500 TWh by the mid-2000s. This period coincided with depletion of conventional oil fields, growing dependence on foreign oil, and the rise of OPEC's market power.

Saudi Arabia (pink line) grew dramatically from the 1960s-1980s, stabilizing around 5,000-6,000 TWh.

Russia peaked in the 1980s at nearly 7,000 TWh before collapsing in the 1990s following the Soviet Union's dissolution.

Iraq, UAE, Oman, and Qatar grew but remained smaller producers (mostly under 2,000 TWh).

The most dramatic feature is the near-vertical rise of US production starting around 2008. This "shale boom" was enabled by hydraulic fracturing (fracking), horizontal drilling technology, and access to vast shale oil formations (Permian Basin, Bakken, Eagle Ford).

By 2020, US production reached an unprecedented 9,500 TWh - higher than any country has ever produced. There's a notable dip around 2020 (COVID-19 pandemic impact), followed by rapid recovery.

Current Landscape

Today, the US produces roughly 50% more oil than Saudi Arabia and has fundamentally altered global energy geopolitics by reducing Western dependence on OPEC nations.

Note:

Oil production is not typically measured in terawatt hours (TWh) or megawatt hours (MWh) - those are units of energy, specifically electrical energy. Oil is normally measured in:

Barrels per day (bbl/d or bpd)
Million barrels per day (MMbpd)
Tonnes or cubic meters

This graph is converting oil production into its energy equivalent in terawatt hours, essentially showing how much energy the oil represents rather than the volume produced. This is done by calculating the thermal/chemical energy content of the oil.

Shale oil is crude oil trapped in shale rock formations, dense, layered sedimentary rock. This oil has been there for millions of years, and geologists have known about these deposits for decades. The problem was: how do you get it out? Traditional oil sits in porous rock formations where it can flow relatively easily to a well. Shale oil is trapped in rock with very low permeability - like trying to squeeze water out of a brick.

The "revolution" came from combining two technologies:

Horizontal drilling and
Hydraulic fracturing (fracking).

These techniques existed separately for years, but combining them and perfecting them at scale in the mid-2000s made shale oil economically viable.

So shell oil unlocked massive oil reserves in the US (Permian Basin in Texas, Bakken in North Dakota, etc.) and turned the US from a declining producer into the world's largest.

It also reduced dependence on Middle Eastern oil, and changed global energy politics.

Source for datasets : https://www.lseg.com/en/data-analytics/market-data#our-data

Source for datasets (2): https://www.energyinst.org/statistical-review

Source for the plot:, https://www.ft.com/content/c618a4c0-740e-4dbf-bbde-192b8b754223

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