By Myra P. Saefong The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries could flood the market with oil for years if it opts to do nothing to alter its output ceiling at a highly-anticipated meeting in June. “If they don’t do something and find a way to get on the same page, we will all be floating on a glut of oil for a very long time,” warned Kevin Kerr, president of Kerr Trading International. Questions about OPEC’s oil production are being raised as the oil cartel is set to call its first meeting since November 2014. Back then, OPEC’s vow not to cut output sent crude-oil prices plunging. Although prices have recovered somewhat in recent weeks, they are still sharply off their 2014 peak levels. OPEC has maintained a collective production ceiling of 30 million barrels a day since it did away with individual country quotas about three years ago, and analysts expect the oil cartel to stand pat on that target when members meet on June 5 in Vienna. But if OPEC decides not to change its target, it’ll be a “big signal that it is determined to continue with its policy to not give away market share,” even if prices fall as a result, Bhushan Bahree, senior director of OPEC and Middle East research at IHS told MarketWatch. OPEC oil production estimates OPEC has already been pumping more than it said it would. The group produced 30.93 million barrels a day in April — the highest monthly total since November 2012, according to a Platts survey of OPEC and oil-industry officials and analysts released May 8. Output in Saudi Arabia, OPEC’s biggest producer and the country with the most spare output capacity, is on the rise, topping 10 million barrels a day in April. The Saudis have “effectively said, by doing what it’s doing” and not cutting output despite the drop in prices, that it would “rather maintain its share of the [oil] market and that other high-cost producers should cut,” said Bahree, who was at the November OPEC summit and plans to attend next month’s meeting. Production has climbed even though prices for West Texas Intermediate CLN5, +0.28% and Brent LCON5, +0.14% crude still trade more than 40% below their peak prices from last summer. ‘The real ongoing question here is the future of OPEC vs. non-OPEC supply and production.’ Kevin Kerr, Kerr Trading International Oil producers ‘must come to some agreement on [output] curbs, or it’s like a game of musical chairs without any chairs,” said Kerr. “Everyone loses.” The “real ongoing question here is the future of OPEC vs. non-OPEC supply and production,” he said. Saudi Arabia has made it clear that it doesn’t want to lose market share to non-OPEC producers. The “battle” for market share has just begun, the International Energy Agency said in its latest monthly oil report. At the meeting in November, OPEC decided not to cut production and that was “only the first step in a plan that includes actually ramping up output and aggressively investing in future production capacity,” IEA said. But it’s “not just a question of non-OPEC supply when it comes to sharing out the oil-market pie,” Kerr said. There also will be the recovery of Iran’s oil output to contend with, assuming sanctions on the country are lifted if it strikes a definitive deal with Western powers over its nuclear program. “They better take Iran’s output recovery seriously because Iran is determined to pump as much as possible,” said Kerr. The OPEC meeting takes place just weeks ahead of the June 30 deadline for a final nuclear agreement between Iran and six world powers. The pact is expected to lead to sanctions on Tehran being lifted, as well as the eventual return of more than one million barrels a day of Iranian crude to global markets, said Kerr. In a matter of months, Iran could lift output by around half a million barrels a day or maybe more, said Bahree. “Beyond that, it’ll take time” to get the financing and find the expertise it needs to further raise output. As for the OPEC meeting, “there’s no sign that anything is imminent in terms of a “combined wider agreement beyond OPEC to reduce production,” Bahree said. But OPEC didn’t do anything at its last meeting in November and “that was a decision that shaped everything,” he said. Brent prices have dropped 12% since then.