Portal partners
PKN Orlen brings in less Russian oil and reaches for raw material from the Gulf
Author:Mariusz Dasiewicz
The oil purchased in Saudi Arabia is an increasingly large part of the total raw material purchased by the Polish company. Orlen strengthens cooperation with the Saudi Aramco giant and thus almost half of the oil imported to Poland comes from a direction other than Russian.
State fuel companies have been trying for some time to reduce the volume of oil imported from Russia. This is to be part of a broader government strategy aimed at independent Poland from the supply of energy resources from Russia. The scale of this dependence in the fuel sector was indeed appalling. We have already written on the Shipyard Portal that, for example, in the years 2007-2013, Russian oil accounted for 90% of the total raw material going to the refinery of the Orlen Group. Over the past years, this situation has started to change to the detriment of Russian companies, especially Rosnieft.
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Besides, Rosnieft is still the main oil supplier for Orlen, but it can no longer be claimed to have a monopoly. This also applies to deliveries to another state-owned company. The Lotos Group also follows the trend and diversifys the supply directions of raw materials, from which it produces fuels sold later on at well-known petrol stations.
Diversification of oil supply to Polish refineries began to crawl in the very end of the rule of the previous PO-PSL team. It was then that the first oil ship bought in Saudi Arabia wrapped up in Naftoport. However, it should be noted that only when the head of Orlen became Wojciech Jasinski, the state company signed the first permanent agreement with the giant Suadi Aramco. On the basis of this contract, 300 000 tonnes of oil from the Persian Gulf goes to Orlen industrial plants every year. Previously, the company reported that these deliveries were not only directed to refineries located in Poland, but also to those located in the Czech Republic and Lithuania. This agreement was annexed last April
The search for new suppliers of Orlen was announced on January 15. This was not an accidental date, because it was at that time that the company publicly announced the purchase of WTI oil from the United States. It's raw material for the refinery in Modajki. On the other hand, a few days earlier, Orlen had signed a contract to supply 120,000 oil from Nigeria.
Moreover, in the United States oil is also purchased by the Gdańsk Lotos, which at the beginning of oil emphasized that already 30% of its raw material comes from a direction other than Russian.
Orlen now points out that approximately 1.4 million tonnes of oil are delivered to the Płock refinery every month, of which about 700 000 tonnes are raw materials from alternative directions. Much of the oil comes from Saudi Arabia, specifically from Saudi Aramco.
"Cooperation with Saudi Aramco expands. This is evidenced by the new commercial agreements concluded with the subsidiaries of the company, e.g. the contract with the Saudi Aramco Products Trading Company for additional deliveries of Saudi oil to the PKN Orlen refinery, as well as the purchase by the Saudi partner of heavy fuel oil produced by ORLEN Lieutva", the Polish company announced in a press release dated 12 April.
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Orlen points out that he only brought 3.5 million tonnes of oil to Saudi Arabia last year. On the other hand, on the basis of new contracts signed last week, about 800 thousand tonnes will be purchased. This means that "the volume of imported Saudi oil will increase to around 400,000 tonnes of raw material per month", reported the Polish fuel company.
W komunikacie Orlenu czytamy również, że zgodnie z nowo podpisaną umową „Orlen będzie mógł sprowadzić sześć ładunków saudyjskiej ropy. Wolumen będzie każdorazowo ustalany z producentem w zależności od bieżących potrzeb”. Ropa będzie mogła być transportowana albo do gdańskiego Naftoportu albo do terminalu w litewskiej Butyndze.
Orlen podkreśla również, że dzięki polityce dywersyfikacji kierunków dostaw obecnie 30 proc. ropy przerabianej przez należące do koncernu rafinerie w Polsce, Czechach oraz na Litwie pochodzi spoza Rosji. Jeżeli zaś chodzi o ropę naftową trafiającą do zakładów Orlenu w Polsce, to już blisko 50 proc. sprowadzanego surowca ma pochodzenie inne niż rosyjskie. „Obecnie do rafinerii w Płocku oprócz rosyjskiej ropy sprowadzana jest ropa z Norwegii, Angoli, Nigerii i właśnie Arabii Saudyjskiej”, czytamy w komunikacie koncernu.
Podpis: am (fot.: PKN Orlen)
