Turkish bitumen trading and supply firm Guven is planning to ship regular bitumen cargoes to the Bulgarian Black Sea port of Burgas, with most of the volumes to be moved by rail to the inland Floresti terminal in Romania.
The first such railcar shipment, amounting to around 3,000t, reached Floresti at the end of last week after ship-to-railcar transfer at Burgas of the first bitumen cargo moved by Guven from its Black Sea bitumen terminal at Trabzon to the Bulgarian port on board the 4,999 deadweight tonne (dwt) bitumen tanker Sidra, that arrived at Burgas on 22 May.
The cargoes from Trabzon are sourced from Iraqi Kurdistan refinery production.
The 5,500m³ Floresti terminal is operated by Guven's local unit Guven Asfalt Romania that also operates a 16,500m³ bitumen storage and supply facility at Medgidia situated along a canal running from the main oil and bitumen terminal facilities at the Romanian Black Sea port of Constanta.
The remainder of the first Sidra cargo volumes, estimated at 1,000-1,500t, is likely to be earmarked for supply into an inland Bulgarian terminal operated by a local firm.
Guven has already shipped its second consecutive Trabzon loading cargo on the Sidra, which arrived at Burgas yesterday. Several more such cargo movements are planned over the coming peak demand season months for the road paving heavy product, with Guven considering whether to continue those operations using the Sidra, or potentially charter a larger bitumen tanker in the 5,500-6,000dwt size range for those operations.
The Turkish firm is at the same time looking ahead to receiving its new-build bitumen tanker, the 8,500 dwt Havva Ana, currently being completed at a Chinese shipyard. That tanker is also expected to be utilised for Black Sea shipments mainly targeting the key Romanian market, as well as potential movements on cross-Mediterranean routes.
The Guven flows will add to Romanian market competition, with Bulgarian and Greek truck exports to Romania consistently priced on a delivered basis at significantly lower prices than for domestically produced volumes at Rompetrol's Vega refinery in Ploiesti, the country's only bitumen producing refinery. The Bulgarian flows largely come from Lukoil's Burgas refinery that's estimated to be currently producing 25,000-30,000t per month of bitumen for supply into domestic and regional export markets.
