Russia will stop exporting oil from the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline

Russian oil company Lukoil will stop exporting the oil it was extracting from the Caspian Sea oil fields of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline from December due to sanctions by Western countries, directing it to the Caspian Pipeline Consortium system. (CPC).

The news was based on information provided to Reuters by four sources with knowledge of the matter. Under the European Union (EU) embargo, which will begin on December 5, European buyers will be barred from buying and transporting Russian oil.

Oil exports from the CPC system, which is one of the main routes for Kazakh oil, will be exempt from the embargo. “Russian oil is coming out of BTC, it is because of sanctions, BTC does not accept Russian oil,” one of the sources said.

WESTERN SHAREHOLDERS PRESSURED

Other sources, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the issue, reported that the decision not to include Russian oil in BTC was made under the leadership of Western BTC shareholders.

Lukoil exports approximately two million tons of oil per year from the Yury Korchagin and Filanovsky fields in the Caspian Sea via the BTC pipeline.

According to the lead export schedule for December and Reuters calculations, Russian oil exports, which are currently low on the CPC line, are expected to rise to 660,000 tons in December from 364,000 tons in November. Lukoil, on the other hand, did not respond to questions from the CPC. (Reuters)