Shell stations in Indonesia have run out of all grades of gasoline, and all three Shell-supplied gasoline grades are now unavailable across its retail stations, the company said on its website.
The oil major will continue to co-ordinate with the Indonesian government and other stakeholders to restore gasoline availability "as soon as possible", it said on 3 October. The company's stations remain open to sell diesel and other non-fuel products such as lubricants, said Shell.
Local market sources reported a similar situation at other private fuel stations, largely from BP-AKR and Vivo, with gasoline grades running dry at many, if not the majority, of these stations.
This represents a further escalation of fuel supply challenges in Indonesia, following shortages first reported around August. The three gasoline grades were previously unavailable at certain outlets until further notice, Shell had said, while BP faced similar fuel shortages at some stations.
The shortfall prompted state-owned Pertamina to import additional transport fuel on behalf of these private-sector operators who were facing import quota constraints. Private firms like Shell, Vivo Energy, BP and ExxonMobil had agreed to buy supplementary volumes from Pertamina, mostly consisting of base gasoline blendstock to be blended at each operator's facilities, Indonesia's energy and mineral resources minister announced in September.
But some private firms backed out of buying the base fuel because the cargo had an ethanol content of around 3.5pc, even though the levels remained within the 20pc limit permitted under energy ministry regulations, Pertamina told the Indonesian parliament last week. Ethanol is an oxygenate used to raise the Ron rating in gasoline.
The private firms may have intended to buy non-oxygenated gasoline, gasoline traders told Argus. But when the cargoes were delivered, the presence of ethanol suggested the cargo was oxygenated. This could have created a price discrepancy between the grade agreed upon and the delivered product, given that non-oxygenated gasoline is typically valued higher than oxygenated grades. This discrepancy may have prompted the firms to reject the shipment, a gasoline trader added, although this could not be independently verified with the parties involved.
