Transneft says quality of Russian oil exports may fall further

MOSCOW, Dec 18 (PRIME) -- The quality of Russian export oil blend may fall further as the share of low-quality high-sulfur crude will increase by 3–3.5 million tonnes to 83 million tonnes, Sergei Andronov, a vice president at oil pipeline monopoly Transneft, said in an interview to corporate magazine published Friday.

“The annual increase of the share of high sulphur amounts to 3–3.5 million tonnes, and the total amount of high-sulfur oil to be pumped into the (pipeline) system in 2015 is expected at 83 million tonnes. The increase may lead to changes in quality of oil transferred to Russian refineries and to a decrease of quality of our main export flows,” he said.

On Thursday, oil major Lukoil’s CEO Vagit Alekperov said traditional buyers of Russia’s Urals oil, Hungary’s MOL and Finland’s Neste, complained that the quality of the Urals is falling. He said he will submit a request to the government to attract attention to the problem.

In 2014, Transneft suggested a transfer of high-sulfur crude into a separateá 23 million tonne export flow to the Ust-Luga port to create a new oil blend with quality equal to Kirkuk and Basrah Blend.

Transneft will have to spend about 2.5 billion rubles on the transfer because it will use the existing pipeline infrastructure of the Druzhba and BTS-2 pipelines.

(70.5806 rubles – U.S. $1)

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