oil prices surged past 110 a barrel to levels not seen since 2013 on wednesday as investors concerns mounted over potential supply disruptions from an intensifying russiaukraine war oil prices were already climbing on tuesday amid concerns over warfueled supply disruptions when the international energy agency said its member countries agreed to release 60 million barrels of oil from their emergency reserves the gains continued in futures trading with analysts commenting that the extra oil was a mere drop in the bucket of what would be needed to deal with potential disruptions read oil surges but history says prices eventually fall after countries release emergency reserves “russia is starting a new phase of the campaign bringing a lot more force to bear and shelling civilian areas this poses the risk that the west will encounter growing pressure to sanction russian oil and gas exports with all that would entail” said neil wilson chief market analyst for marketscom in a note to clients “centrica said it is urgently seeking to end its natural gas supply agreement with gazprom – selfsanctioning already well under way exxon mobil followed shell and bp to say it will exit russia leaving 4bn in assets in doubt we are seeing this with the container ships too and banks moreover oil traders are already starting to try to secure alternatives” said wilson war in ukraine russian troops encircling key cities as assaults stepped up on urban areas in seventh day of conflict investors will now turn their attention to wednesday’s monthly meeting of opec the organization of the petroleum exporting countries and their allies including russia the producer group is expected to make a decision on oil production levels for april but analysts expect them to continue with a plan to raise production by 400000 barrels per day wilson said the cartel’s technical experts cut their expectations for the daily oil market surplus by 200000 barrels to 11 million barrels with fuel stockpiles in developed nations expected to be 62m barrels below the 2015 to 2019 average by the end of 2022 from a previous shortfall of 20m barrels “but the market is not really moving on this as much as just pure fear of immediate disruption to supplies traders are getting hold of barrels at any price” said wilson