Economic geographer Roger Stern has predicted in a recent study in a U.S. National Academy of Sciences publication that Iran might run out of oil for export by 2015. Stern, a researcher at John Hopkins University, spoke with RFE/RL correspondent Golnaz Esfandiari about what this might mean.

The price of crude oil has fallen to its lowest level in more than 18 months as mild weather in the northern hemisphere has caused inventories to rise.

OPEC is under pressure to cut oil production. Dramatic changes could bring new developments around OPEC.

Delegates to the OPEC meeting in Nigeria say the oil cartel plans to cut production by 500,000 barrels a day starting in February.

The 10 OPEC members bound by the cartel's output agreements produced an average 27.07 million barrels per day (b/d) in November, down 660,000 b/d from October, but still well above the group's new 26.3 million b/d output target, a Platts survey showed December 8.