Milazzo to receive more Venezuelan crude: Update

adds Eni comment

Italy's 235,000 b/d Milazzo refinery, jointly run by domestic integrated firm Eni and Kuwait's state-owned KPC, is preparing to receive its second cargo of Venezuelan crude in the space of a month.

The Delta Captain is waiting to discharge around 750,000 bl, according to Argus tracking data. It comes after sister ship the Delta Tolmi delivered 470,000 bl around 5 July, the first Venezuelan crude at Milazzo since February 2019.

The Delta Captain took receipt of the Venezuelan crude via a ship-to-ship transfer in the harbour at Augusta, Sicily around 29 July. It took the oil from the Bouboulina, which sailed on with the remainder of the cargo to Genoa.

Eni engages in Venezuelan crude-for-diesel swaps and debt recovery arrangements through an exception to US sanctions. The company is a 50pc partner with Spain's Repsol at Venezuela's offshore Perla gas field, where state-owned PdV pays for production with crude supply.

"Eni has been recovering its receivables with PdV related to Perla gas sales through crude supplies, abiding by the relevant legal framework and in continuous dialogue with Italian, EU and US authorities, " Eni told Argus.

"As part of this credit recovery scheme, Eni is giving back to PdV part of the value in diesel. Such transactions are also duly monitored and carried out in full compliance of all applicable laws, and in close contact with competent authorities and will be maintained in the future as long as they will be considered to be fully compliant with applicable international rules."

Overall crude receipts at Milazzo increased to 110,000 b/d last month from just 90,00 b/d in June, according to Argus tracking. Deliveries averaged 145,000 b/d in the first seven months of the year, around 60pc of capacity.

July's imports included 35,000 b/d of US WTI, a little over 20,000 b/d each of Iraqi Basrah Light and Baltic Urals, and 10,000 b/d of Nigerian Forcados. The rest was made up of the Venezuelan crude.

Argus assessed Milazzo's crude receipts at a weighted average gravity of 31.5°API and sulphur content of 1.2pc in July, compared with 33.7°API and 1.2pc in June and 32.4°API and 1.7pc in May.

The refinery shipped a 225,000 bl naphtha cargo to the French port of Fos-Lavera last month, taken by Total and UK-Chinese venture Petroineos probably to run at their Naphthachimie petrochemical unit at the port.

There is little sign that the pace of crude receipts at Milazzo is increasing this month. Besides the Delta Captain, a single cargo of around 600,000 bl of Kazakh CPC Blend is due to discharge, with no other tankers signalling arrival.

By Adam Porter

Milazzo crude receipts mn bl