Transneft exec says no more contaminated oil in Russian pipelines

MOSCOW, Dec 7 (PRIME) -- There is no more contaminated oil in Transneft’s pipeline system in Russia, a top executive said in a conference call on Friday.

“Talking about contaminated oil, and I see questions about it, the issue with its presence in our system has been solved completely, there is no more contaminated oil in Transneft’s system on the territory of the Russian Federation,” the executive said.

Transneft has already paid U.S. $143.6 million in compensation of cargo senders’ losses from receiving and refining contaminated oil. The company will continue working on compensations, it is to settle a large claim until the end of the year, and the work should be finished until mid-2021, the top executive said.

The company also expects its operating expenditures to fall by more than 10% in 2020, the executive said without providing any absolute figures, the executive said.

Russia started pumping oil contaminated with chlorides via the Druzhba export pipeline through Belarus in April 2019. Transneft is to compensate for the losses that all companies and oil refineries suffered because of the incident.

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