Seaborne diesel and gasoil supplies to Poland's Baltic Sea ports reached all- time highs in March, following a maintenance turnaround at the 210,000 b/d Gdansk refinery and market volatility arising from the Mideast Gulf war.
Diesel arrivals were almost 776,000t in March, exceeding the record 667,000t of May 2022, Vortexa data show.
State-owned Orlen, Aramco Fuels Poland, Unimot, Select Energy, BP and Oktan Energy shipped diesel to Poland's ports in March, market participants said.
The first two emerged as the biggest importers, increasing purchases in March because of a planned turnaround at the Gdansk refinery, which is operated by a 70:30 joint venture of Orlen and Saudi state-controlled Aramco, and because of the uncertainty about diesel supplies from the Middle East conflict.
Diesel deliveries to Gdansk surged to 308,000t in March from 54,000t in February. Market participants said Orlen imported six diesel cargoes to Gdansk last month. Deliveries to the port of Gdynia, the main import hub for independent traders in Poland, were almost 290,000t, and supplies to Swinoujscie-Szczecin accounted for 177,600t.
Poland received seaborne diesel from the Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (ARA) region, the US, Finland and Sweden.
Prices for seaborne diesel on a cif Gdynia basis in the second half of March fluctuated between $96.75/t and $127.75/t cif premiums to front-month Ice April gasoil futures.
Polish companies exported seaborne diesel to Ukraine, mostly from Swinoujscie-Szczecin and Gdynia. Poland sold 160,500t of diesel delivered via Polish ports to Ukraine in March from 138,000t in February, according to market participants.
Cumulative diesel imports to the Polish ports were 1.34mn t in January-March, up from 730,500t in the same period in 2025.
