Crisis in Oil Supply Announced in Romania

On Monday, the Romanian Ministry of Energy declared a crisis-level emergency regarding crude oil supply, allowing the extraction of thousands of tons of oil and diesel from the country's reserves due to contamination at a Turkish oil terminal.

This information was reported by Romania Journal, citing Profit.ro.

The emergency declaration was triggered by contamination at the Ceyhan oil terminal in Turkey, which affected a shipment of crude oil from Azerbaijan intended for the Petrobrazi refinery operated by OMV Petrom.

BTC Pipeline, the operator of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, reported that several tanks at the terminal were contaminated with corrosive substances. It was noted that the shipment of Azerbaijani crude oil scheduled to arrive at the Constanta port was not received, leading to a temporary shortage of crude at Petrobrazi. Given the situation, it was decided that the quickest solution until the arrival of a new shipment of imported oil would be to utilize mandatory reserves established by OMV Petrom under current legislation.

The order issued by the Ministry of Energy allowed OMV Petrom to use 80,000 tons of crude oil and 30,000 tons of diesel fuel from emergency reserves for crude oil and petroleum products. This reserve was created by the company as part of a legal storage obligation, which currently totals 676,248 tons for this year.

According to the law, the company now has two months to restore its reserves to the required level.