India’s state-owned Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited has recently bought a total of four million barrels of Nigerian crude as the country’s refiners intensify efforts to secure alternative supplies amid the US-Iran crisis and disruptions to Middle Eastern oil shipments.
According to Reuters, HPCL purchased two million barrels of Nigerian crude through tenders in two separate transactions, with the latest deal involving one million barrels each of Forcados and Bonga crude grades bought from Shell.
The cargoes are expected to supply HPCL’s Visakh refinery in Andhra Pradesh, southern India, which has a crude processing capacity of 300,000 barrels per day. The latest purchase came after HPCL earlier acquired another two million barrels of Nigerian crude from commodity trader Glencore through a tender.
The earlier purchase comprised one million barrels each of Okwuibome and Utapate crude grades from Nigeria. The crude bought from Glencore will be supplied to HPCL’s Rajasthan refinery, HPCL Rajasthan Refinery Limited, which has a processing capacity of 180,000 barrels per day.
According to Oilprice.com, HPCL owns a 74 per cent stake in HRRL, while the remaining stake is held by the Rajasthan State Government.
The purchases highlight the growing demand for Nigerian crude among Indian refiners as supplies from the Middle East remain disrupted by shipping constraints around the Strait of Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb.
It was learnt that several Indian refiners have recently bought crude from Oman and West Africa through tenders as term supplies from the Middle East remain constrained.
India’s state-controlled Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Limited has also acquired about one million barrels of Omani crude through a tender at a premium of about $3 per barrel to Dated Brent from Mitsui & Co Energy Trading Singapore, according to trade sources cited by Reuters earlier this week.
Meanwhile, Indian Oil Corporation, the country’s largest refiner by capacity, has bought four million barrels of West African crude from Chevron.
The purchase includes Angola’s Nemba, Saxi Batuque and Clov grades, as well as Congo’s Djeno crude. Indian refiners are increasingly looking to crude suppliers as far away as Angola in Africa and Venezuela in South America after term supplies from the Middle East were again disrupted in July and failed to reach India as scheduled.
Meanwhile, data from Oilprice.com showed that oil prices rose to $81 per barrel on Thursday, up from $79 on Wednesday
