Germany and Poland Suspend Russian Oil Imports on Contamination Concerns

Germany and Poland have suspended imports of Russian oil amid contamination concerns, prompting a rare crisis over supply from the world’s second-largest exporter.

The sudden suspension of imports from the Soviet-built Druzhba pipeline, which runs from Russia via Belarus to central Europe, risks starving major European refineries of their major source of crude.


Brent crude graph

German plants belonging to Total, Shell, Eni and Rosneft as well as refineries belonging to Poland’s PKN Orlen and Grupa Lotos were all reportedly at risk.

The Druzhba pipeline can ship up to 1 million barrels per day (bpd), according to data sourced by Reuters — approximately 1% of global demand.

“The first thing to note is that this incident involving contaminated Russian oil is rare occurrence,” Stephen Brennock, oil analyst at PVM Oil Associates, told CNBC via email on Thursday.

via CNBC

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Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza