* China Sept crude imports up 5.5% m/m to 11.8 million bpd
* Pandemic could delay energy demand recovery to 2025 -IEA
(Updates prices)
By Ahmad Ghaddar
LONDON, Oct 13 (Reuters) - Oil prices rebounded on Tuesday
as robust China data offset returning supply in Norway, the Gulf
of Mexico and Libya.
Brent crude futures rose 63 cents, or 1.5%, to
$42.35 a barrel by 1224 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI)
crude futures rose 71 cents, or 1.8%, to $40.14 a barrel.
China, the world's top crude oil importer, took in 11.8
million barrels per day (bpd) of oil in September, up 5.5% from
August and up 17.5% from a year earlier, customs data showed.
"Currently, oil demand is driven primarily by China,"
Commerzbank said.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) - which advises
Western governments on energy policy - said in its World Energy
Outlook that in its central scenario a vaccine and therapeutics
could mean the global economy rebounds in 2021 and energy demand
recovers by 2023.
But under a "delayed recovery scenario", it said the energy
demand recovery is pushed back to 2025.
"The era of global oil demand growth will come to an end
within the next 10 years, but in the absence in a large shift in
government policies, I don't see a clear sign of a peak," IEA
chief Fatih Birol told Reuters.
Lockdown measures were being tightened in Britain and the
Czech Republic to battle rising cases of COVID-19, and French
Prime Minister Jean Castex said he could not rule out local
lockdowns.
On the supply side, workers have been returning to U.S. Gulf
of Mexico platforms after Hurricane Delta and Norwegian workers
to offshore rigs after ending a strike.
OPEC member Libya on Sunday also lifted force majeure at its
Sharara oilfield.
Libya's total output on Monday was expected to hit 355,000
bpd while a full return of the 300,000 bpd Sharara field would
nearly double that.
(Additional reporting by Sonali Paul and Shu Zhang; editing by
Susan Fenton and Jason Neely)