Europe does not want to buy dirty oil from Azerbaijan: a month in a tanker

The oil from Azerbaijan contaminated with organic chlorides has been in the tanker for more than a month. The ship continues to be in the Atlantic Ocean. Obviously, the owner cannot sell the lot.

The Delta Blue tanker continues to be in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Portugal. This is evidenced by the AIS data of the courts. The tanker, which can carry up to 158 thousand tons of oil, has been maneuvering in the ocean for three weeks. And four — as he left the Turkish port of Ceyhan. The vessel indicates that it is in standby mode for orders.

Judging by the draft, 15.9 meters out of 17.1, there are more than 100 thousand tons of Azerbaijani oil on the tanker. Obviously, the owner of the cargo cannot sell the lot, whose value may be about $ 70 million.

The vessel left Ceyhan on July 17, after which the terminal was stopped due to contamination until July 23.

As EADaily reported, the Italian Eni announced the receipt of contaminated oil at its refineries, followed by the Austrian OMV and the Czech division of the Polish Orlen confirmed the import of raw materials with chlorides that did not have time to reach the refining facilities. In Romania, in turn, a state of emergency was introduced, as a batch of contaminated oil of 90 thousand tons forced OMV Petrom to take raw materials for its refineries from the country's strategic reserves.

British BP, which is the operator of production in Azerbaijan and the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline, confirmed substandard oil.

"The results of the assessment confirm the presence of organic chlorides in some tanks at the Ceyhan terminal. Appropriate measures were taken to isolate these tanks, while loading from the tanks continued, which were assessed as meeting normal specifications," Tamam Bayatli, head of Communications at BP Azerbaijan, said on AnewZ.

Reuters reported that discounts on Azerbaijani oil reached a four-year high.

Substandard oil can be used, but for this it is mixed with high-quality raw materials in such a proportion that the chloride level drops sharply and meets the standards.

The Romanian authorities are considering a scenario according to which there may be a Russian trace in the contamination of Azerbaijani oil with chlorides. Bucharest insists that the emergency situation threatens Europe's energy security. At the same time, facts and experts say that the reason for everything was more likely to be a technical error.