U.S.-led airstrikes and high commodity prices have made it more expensive for the Islamic State to run its fledgling oil sector, Platts reports. A bombing campaign that began in October has decimated the group’s energy infrastructure and killed many of the oil workers it hired from outside Iraq and Syria to run it. Meanwhile, fuel costs have surged and a chief supply route was cut off when ISIS was driven out of the Iraqi town of Sinjar in November.
Platts estimates ISIS produced 70,000 barrels of oil per day and earned $40 million per month from oil sales.
