Saudi Arabia and Iraq ramp up oil supplies to Europe

Saudi Arabia and Iraq are diverting more and more of their crude oil toward Europe, helping the continent’s oil refineries to overcome a pivot away from Russia.

More than 1 million barrels a day of crude has made its way to Europe from the Middle East in the first three weeks of July via a pipeline that crosses Egypt, according to vessel-tracking data compiled by Bloomberg, Report informs.

Volumes have roughly doubled from a year ago.

Deliveries from the Middle East could increase to 2.2 million barrels per day, up 90% from January.

Saudi Arabia supplies tankers with oil to Egypt. From there, the crude enters the Sumed pipeline, which connects the Ain Sokhna terminal on the Red Sea with the Mediterranean port of Sidi Kerir. There, the oil is again shipped to tankers and sent to Europe.

In the first three weeks of July, more than 1 million barrels of oil per day flowed through the pipeline - this is twice as much as in the same period in 2021 and 200,000 barrels more than last month.

Iraq sends oil only by sea. In total, the tankers that sailed from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean through the Suez Canal carried about 1.2 million barrels of oil per day. Most of the oil was shipped in Iraq.