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Main Oil Port News

01 Mar 2024

Venezuela Oil Exports Rising, but Shipping Delays Persist

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Venezuela's oil exports slightly increased in February to some 670,000 barrels per day (bpd), but ongoing shipping delays worsened a bottleneck of tankers waiting to load, according to documents and vessel monitoring data.State-run oil firm PDVSA's customers have rushed to send tankers to Venezuela in recent months to pick up crude and fuel before the United States potentially reimposes oil sanctions.Restrictions could resume on April 18 when an existing license expires, the U.S.

03 Jun 2022

Venezuela's Oil Exports Plummet to Lowest in 19 Months on Port Delays

© Francis / Adobe Stock

Venezuela's oil exports last month fell to the lowest level since October 2020 as repairs at the country's main oil port added to delays shipping cargoes, documents from state-run PDVSA and vessel tracking data showed.Exports from the U.S.-sanctioned country were recovering this year following a pact with Iran that provided a stable supply of diluents needed for producing exportable grades and lighter crudes for making refined products.But shipping delays linked to oil quality issues…

31 Jan 2022

Iranian Oil Tanker to Discharge 2 Million Barrels in Venezuela

An Iranian supertanker carrying about 2 million barrels of condensate this week began discharging at Venezuelan state-run oil company PDVSA's main oil port, according to a company document and tanker tracking services.PDVSA and state-run National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) in the second half of last year started a swap deal to exchange Iranian condensate for PDVSA's heavy crude. The pact has proven to be key for sustaining Venezuela's oil output, which needs diluents including condensate for transportation and exports.Last year, the two state companies that are under U.S. sanctions exchanged some 4.82 million barrels of condensate for 5.55 million barrels of heavy crude, mostly transported in Iran-flagged vessels.

19 May 2021

Tanker Bottleneck Emerges in Venezuela as Crude Stocks Run Low

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More than a dozen large tankers were waiting on Wednesday at Venezuela's main oil port and nearby anchorage zones for state-run PDVSA to assign them slots to load crude, as an outage and low inventories caused delays, according to documents and sources.Venezuela's crude output declined in April to 445,000 barrels per day (bpd), according to secondary sources consulted by OPEC, down 81,000 bpd from March levels. The drop was mainly due to a lack of diluents to produce exportable grades from the country's largest oil region…

02 Mar 2021

Venezuelan Oil Exports Rise on Larger Sales to Asia

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Venezuela’s oil exports rose in February to over 700,000 barrels per day (bpd), their highest level in 10 months, pushed by more sales of fuel oil cargoes to new clients in Asian markets, according to Refinitiv Eikon’s tanker tracking data and documents.A growing number of clients with no track record in oil trading has been helping Venezuela’s state-run PDVSA to allocate crude and fuel in Asia, especially since the U.S. Treasury Department halted oil swaps by PDVSA’s long-term customers in the last quarter of 2020 as part of tightening sanctions.These buyers…

14 Dec 2020

Iran Uses Disguised Tanker to Export Venezuelan Oil

A tanker chartered by the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) is loading Venezuelan crude for export, documents from state-run PDVSA show, providing evidence of the two countries’ latest tactics to expand their trade in defiance of U.S. sanctions.Venezuela and Iran have deepened their cooperation this year as Venezuela has exchanged gold and other commodities for Iranian food, condensate and fuel.Names of scrapped vessels are being used by several PDVSA (Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A.) customers, including NIOC, to disguise the routes and identities of the tankers they use.A very large crude carrier (VLCC), identified in PDVSA’s loading documents as the Ndros…

12 Sep 2018

PDVSA to Reopen Damaged Port Dock by Month's End

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PDVSA expects to reopen the south dock of Venezuela's main oil port Jose by the end of September, easing strains on crude exports delayed due to a tanker collision last month, according to internal trade documents from the state-run oil firm seen by Reuters.Last week, PDVSA began diverting tankers to Puerto la Cruz for loading, but the South American country's crude exports have remained slow in recent weeks as few customers have accepted the 500,000-barrel-per-cargo maximum neighboring terminals can handle.Besides Puerto la Cruz…

14 Jun 2016

Venezuelan Crude Sales to the US Jump 4% in May

Venezuelan crude oil sales to the United States rose nearly 4 percent in May to 762,000 barrels per day (bpd) after declining since January amid falling output and delays at the country's main oil port, according to Thomson Reuters data on Tuesday. The United States last month received 47 cargoes of Venezuelan crude, a 3.7 percent increase versus the previous month, but still a 2 percent decline versus May 2015, according to trade flows data made with preliminary figures. A larger number of shipments of diluted crude oil (DCO) and Merey blend received by PDVSA's customers, including its refining unit Citgo Petroleum, Valero Energy and Phillips 66, contributed to the growth.

04 Apr 2016

Venezuelan Crude Sales to US Declined 7% in March

Exports of Venezuelan crude to the United States fell almost 7 percent in March versus the same month of 2015 to 793,581 barrels per day (bpd), according to Thomson Reuters Trade Flows data, affected by delays at the country's main oil port. Even though the sales recovered versus the previous two months, when they hit record lows, the increase was not enough to reach last year levels. State-run oil company PDVSA and its joint ventures sent 52 crude cargoes to the United States last month, according to the data, made with preliminary figures. PDVSA's refining unit, Citgo Petroleum, was the main receiver, along with Valero Energy , Phillips 66 and Chevron Corp.

28 Mar 2016

PDVSA Says Operations are Normal at Main Oil Port

Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA on Friday said it guaranteed that operations were normal at its main oil port, adding it had provided "uninterrupted" services to an average of 56 tankers per month. Reuters on Thursday reported heavy backlogs in tanker loadings at the port of Jose, which a union leader and a legislator said were the result of technical problems with loading arms. "PDVSA guarantees normal loading and dispatch at the (port of Jose)," the company wrote on its Twitter account. The company said that 70 percent of the production exported from Venezuela, equivalent to around 1.5 million barrels per day, are loaded at Jose.