Crude oil exports from the United States’ only deepwater port, the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port, doubled in January to a record high, driven by strong demand from Asian refiners, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday, citing tracking data of ships he had compiled.
The Louisiana Offshore Oil Port (LOOP), the only port in the United States capable of handling and fully loading supertankers with 2 million barrels of oil each, saw a total of eight tankers depart for India, China and South Korea in January. These tankers, mostly supertankers, shipped a total of 15 million barrels of oil from the Louisiana oil export terminal last month – double the volume exported from the port in December and a record for the terminal, according to the data. compiled by Bloomberg.
United States crude oil exports are benefiting from the recovery in oil demand in Asia, as well as reductions in term supplies to some Asian customers by the largest producers in OPEC, Saudi Arabia and Iraq.
Saudi Arabia announced reductions in crude oil volumes to be supplied to at least nine customers in Asia and Europe in February. The cuts are made for shipments under long-term contracts and relate to Aramco’s heaviest specifications.
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Iraq, OPEC’s second largest producer after Saudi Arabia, has also reduced – quite unexpectedly – its 2021 term supplies to several major Indian refineries by 10-20 percent.
At the same time, Asia’s main oil importers are estimated to have increased imports by 7.5 percent month-on-month in January, to 26.14 million barrels per day (bpd), according to tanker tracking. and port data compiled by Refinitiv and cited by Reuters.
Chinese oil imports are estimated to have jumped 33 percent to about 12 million bpd, compared to just 9 million bpd in December, data from Refinitiv showed.
India is also boosting imports, with official government data showing that crude oil imports increased 9.5% in December 2020, while crude oil production increased 0.9% compared to December 2019, just before beginning of the pandemic.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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