Turkey has started to diversify its oil supply away from Russia and is buying crude from as far as Brazil after its top refiner limited intake of Russian oil only to G7 price-compliant barrels, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday, quoting data from Vortexa.
So far in March, Russian oil accounted for just 19% of all of Turkey’s crude imports of about 650,000 barrels per day (bpd), according to the data. This compares with more than half of Turkish crude imports sourced from Russia last year.
Last month, Turkey’s largest refiner, Turkiye Petrol Rafinerileri, was prepared to halt on February 27 purchases of any oil and products from Russia that do not comply with the G7 price cap.
Turkiye Petrol Rafinerileri, or Tupras, has become the latest customer of Russian oil that is eager to avoid violating the U.S. sanctions on Russia’s oil trade and exports which the Biden Administration slapped on January 10.
The sanctions designated two major Russian oil companies, Gazprom Neft and Surgutneftegas, as well as 183 vessels, dozens of oil traders, oilfield service providers, insurance companies, and energy officials.
But the price cap mechanism set by the G7 and the EU says that Russian crude shipments to third countries can use Western insurance and financing if cargoes are sold at or below the $60-a-barrel ceiling. The measure took effect at the end of 2022 when the EU imposed an embargo on imports of Russian crude oil.
As Turkey’s Tupras has limited its purchases from Russia, it has bought a cargo of medium sweet crude from Brazil. The cargo departed from Madre De Deus in Brazil on March 3 and is en route to Turkey’s port of Izmit, according to data from MarineTraffic.
The Brazilian cargo would be Turkey’s first import of crude from the South American oil producer in data from the government going back to 2007, according to Bloomberg.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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