The four-decade-old ban on most crude exports from the U.S., now the world’s largest producer, will be weakened bit by bit as government rulings allow exceptions, say energy analysts including IHS Inc. The Commerce Department’s permission for Enterprise Products Partners LP (EPD) and Pioneer Natural Resources Co. (PXD) to ship abroad ultra-light oil known as condensate foreshadows a chain of incremental actions that will chip away at the restriction until it’s obsolete. As much as 1.2 million barrels a day may be freed for export on the recent rulings alone. The ban was passed by Congress in 1975 in response to the Arab oil embargo that cut global supplies, quadrupled crude prices and created gasoline shortages in the U.S. at a time when the country’s own crude production was shrinking. Now that horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing are unleashing record volumes of light oil from U.S. shale formations and […]