Tanker shipments could increase from Russia’s Black Sea port of Novorossiysk as Kazakhstan ups oil production.
Kazakh crude exports are loaded at the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) terminal there.
Consultancy Kpler said Kazakhstan is expected to increase crude oil production in November by 243,000 barrels per day to 1.92m bpd.
This follows the completion of planned maintenance at the country’s 400,000 bpd Kahshgan field.
The rise is the equivalent of more than an aframax cargo every three days.
Earlier in August, Kazakhstan announced a revised plan to cut October production by 265,000 bpd to compensate for its overproduction from the agreed level among the Opec+ group, Kpler said.
The reduction was achieved mainly as a result of the field maintenance.
So far in October, the country’s exports on tankers via the CPC terminal averaged 1.35m bpd, up from 0.92m bpd during the same period in September, Kpler added.
In May, joint venture CPC said it expected to complete work in July 2025 to allow three tankers of up to VLCC size to be loaded simultaneously at its single-point moorings (SPMs).
Bottlenecks to be cut
The idea is to reduce bottlenecks for shipments.
The work is now on to its fourth stage, which includes the installation of a third pressure control unit and a third pressure relief station.
Two SPMs can be used at the same time now, with the third as backup.
CPC is owned 24% by the Russian Federation and 19% by Kazakhstan’s KazMunayGas, with Chevron, Lukoil and ExxonMobil also involved.
Last year, shipbroker BRS said Kazakhstan appeared to be taking steps to cut its dependence on the Russian oil export infrastructure following the Ukraine invasion.
The government had increasingly been exporting crude tanker cargoes across the Caspian Sea, the broker noted.
In 2022, crude loadings at CPC were disrupted following inspections to assess damage to the infrastructure.
The terminal suspended oil loadings from two of three SPMs. Tankers continued to use SPM-3.
Divers discovered cracks in subsea hose attachments to buoyancy tanks, CPC said.
Loadings were previously halted after storm damage earlier that year.
