Kazakhstan's oil exports resumed a symbolic bypass of Russia

The Kazakh state-owned company has resumed oil supplies via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline. The company stopped exporting via this route in August when raw materials from Azerbaijan contaminated with organic chlorides turned out to be in the pipeline.

KazMunayGas has resumed oil exports via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline system," the state—owned company reports.

On September 13, the Ministry of Health of Aktau port in the direction of Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) shipped 8.8 thousand tons of Kashagan oil.

"The next shipment is scheduled for September 20," KazMunayGas said, adding that deliveries through Azerbaijan were suspended in August. The day before, in the second half of July, oil contaminated with organic chlorides was found in the Turkish terminal in the port of Ceyhan, shipments of which managed to reach Italy, Austria and Romania. Chlorides are used to increase production, but they must be removed from the oil before being fed into pipelines, as they are harmful to refinery equipment.

KazMunayGas reported that the volume of transportation of Kazakh oil in the direction of BTC for 8 months amounted to 0.9 million tons.

The Azerbaijani route is a detour. But symbolic. The main volumes of Kazakh oil come through the CPC oil pipeline network, which go through Russia to the oil terminal near Novorossiysk, from where the raw materials are exported by tankers.

Last year, almost 55 million tons of Kazakh oil were exported in this way.