WTI crude oil is making gains in early trading on Thursday, touching the highest level seen in over a year on account of the deep freeze that has shut down oil production and refining across Texas. At the time of writing, WTI crude oil is trading at around $61.73 per barrel.

During the previous session, WTI crude oil prices strengthened by around $1 as markets focused on the impact of the deep freeze on crude production across the world’s largest energy consumer. The unusual cold weather conditions have reduced US’s oil refining output by as much as 20% while crude production has declined by around 1 million bpd.

Since last Thursday, oil prices have risen by over 6% as analysts forecast the deep freeze to impact crude output for at least a few days and possibly even weeks. This could lead to tightening in supply, driving higher buying activity in oil futures among traders and causing the recent bullishness.

Crude oil prices were also supported by the release of the API report in the previous session indicating a larger than expected decline in US crude inventories. According to the API, crude stockpiles in the US reduced by 5.8 million barrels to 468 million barrels over the past week, against expectations for a drop by 2.4 million barrels instead.