Russia's Transneft Retains 2019 Oil Export Plan Despite Dirty Oil Crisis - Vice-President

Russian state-owned oil transport monopoly Transneft is not changing its plans to export about 233 million tonnes of oil in 2019 despite losses caused by scandal around contaminated oil in the Druzhba pipeline, the company's vice-president, Sergey Andronov, told reporters on Friday

NOVOROSSIYSK (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 14th June, 2019) Russian state-owned oil transport monopoly Transneft is not changing its plans to export about 233 million tonnes of oil in 2019 despite losses caused by scandal around contaminated oil in the Druzhba pipeline, the company's vice-president, Sergey Andronov, told reporters on Friday.

"About 233 million tonnes. So far, yes, we have not revised it yet," Andronov said when asked about plans for oil export in 2019.

Transneft fell 4.4-4.5 million tonnes short of the export projections during the time of oil contamination incident but still wants to meet its original goal before the end of 2019, he added.

Earlier this year, Andronov said that according to the requests of shippers, the company planned to pump 50 million tonnes of oil via Druzhba, plus 18 million tonnes to Belarusian refineries.

Problems with the quality of oil coming from Russia to Belarus through the Druzhba pipeline, whose Russian leg is operated by Transneft, arose in April. Poland, Ukraine and several other European states halted oil transit through the pipeline after it was discovered that the oil was contaminated with chlorides. Moscow launched an investigation into the matter and has so far arrested four people over the incident.

Transit of uncontaminated Russian oil to Belarus, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Ukraine and Slovakia has already been restored. However, on May 24, Belarus started to reverse contaminated oil in the Druzhba pipeline back to Russia. As a result, at least 450,000 tonnes of contaminated oil have been returned.