Tag: oil

The South China Sea is a major trade route for crude oil, and in 2016, more than 30% of global maritime crude oil trade, or about 15 million barrels per day, passed through the South China Sea, according to EIA. Additionally, more than 90% of these crude oil volumes transited the Strait of Malacca.

The US Coast Guard responded to the grounding of a barge in Coney Island Channel near Brighton Beach, New York, on Wednesday August 22 morning. There were 14,000 barrels of fuel oil on board the barge but no pollution was reported. The cause of the incident is under investigation.

Enterprise Products Partners is planning to build an offshore crude oil export terminal off the Texas Gulf Coast. The terminal would be able of loading Very Large Crude Carriers, which have capacities of approximately 2 million barrels. The project could include about 80 miles of 42-inch diameter pipeline to an offshore terminal capable of loading and exporting crude oil at approximately 85,000 barrels per hour.

A Singaporean shipping company was ordered to pay $1 million and serve a two-year term of probation for not maintaining an accurate oil record book. The court accused the company for breaching the Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships and for false statements concerning the illegal dumping of oil contaminated bilge water at sea.

The US accused North Korea of breaching the UN sanctions on refined petroleum, as illegal transfers between ships at sea took place. As a result, the US demanded an immediate stop to all sales of the fuel. The US said that these transfers, are breaching the UN sanctions. 

Libya's National Oil Corporation announced that it re-opened four oil terminals after General Khalifa Haftar handed over control of the ports. These ports are Ras Lanuf, Es Sider, Zueitina and Hariga. During this month, NOC had declared force majeure in the said ports, but now they started operations again.

As China's domestic energy consumption has grown, the country has become a significant destination for US energy exports. Namely, China has been among the largest importers of US exports of crude oil, propane, and LNG. In 2017, more US crude oil was sent to China than any other destination except Canada.

A second crude oil tank was set on fire Sunday at the Libyan port of Ras Lanuf, during fighting between rival factions for control of two key export terminals. As a result, storage capacity at Ras Lanuf has been cut by 400,000 barrels, according to Libya’s National Oil Corporation.

In 2017, oil demand grew by 1.7 Mb/d, similar with 2016 and significantly greater than the 10-year average of around 1.2 Mb/d, according to BP. The 2017 demand continued to be driven by oil importers benefitting from the windfall of low prices, with both Europe and the US posting notable increases, compared with average declines over the previous 10 years.

The Port of Corpus Christi, which is US's largest oil export port will attempt to raise $300 million, in order to conduct work which will make the Port ready to handle the US shale export increase. A decision to raise fees for dredging, which could begin as of September, would be a rare move among US Gulf Coast ports.