{"id":27338,"date":"2026-07-15T08:08:56","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T08:08:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/?p=27338"},"modified":"2026-07-15T08:08:56","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T08:08:56","slug":"russia-faces-growing-challenges-in-oil-exports","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/?p=27338","title":{"rendered":"Russia Faces Growing Challenges in Oil Exports"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Russia is facing growing difficulties not only in refining the oil it produces but also in selling it abroad. As demand weakens, loaded tankers are spending extended periods at sea waiting to unload their cargo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Following strikes on its oil refineries, Moscow has attempted to maximize crude oil exports. However, the volume of shipments now exceeds market demand, according to <strong>Bloomberg<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The report says that during the four weeks ending <strong>July 12<\/strong>, Russia&#8217;s seaborne crude oil exports averaged <strong>4.21 million barrels per day<\/strong>, remaining close to the highest levels recorded earlier this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That figure is only <strong>10,000 barrels per day<\/strong> below the highest level seen since the start of Russia&#8217;s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. At that time, however, an additional <strong>600,000 barrels per day<\/strong> were delivered by pipeline to European refineries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">According to <strong>Bloomberg<\/strong>, the surge in Russian crude exports is not being matched by sufficient buyer demand, leaving large volumes of oil stranded aboard tankers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Analysts believe Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries are forcing Moscow to export crude that can no longer be processed domestically. As a result, exports remain elevated even as oil production declines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>OPEC<\/strong> estimates that Russia produced <strong>8.93 million barrels of oil per day<\/strong> in June, roughly <strong>830,000 barrels per day<\/strong> below its production target under the producers&#8217; agreement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At the same time, Russian crude is taking much longer to reach buyers. <strong>Five tankers<\/strong> carrying <strong>Urals<\/strong> crude are currently anchored off Egypt&#8217;s Mediterranean coast, while another <strong>five<\/strong> are waiting near Indonesia&#8217;s <strong>Riau Archipelago<\/strong>, east of Singapore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cargoes of <strong>Sokol<\/strong> and <strong>Sakhalin Blend<\/strong> crude from Russia&#8217;s Far East are also waiting for weeks to be transferred from shuttle tankers to ocean-going vessels. Similar delays are affecting shipments of <strong>ESPO<\/strong> crude, with some tankers remaining idle for weeks near the Pacific port of <strong>Kozmino<\/strong> after loading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">According to <strong>Bloomberg<\/strong>, these delays have increased the total volume of Russian crude stored at sea to approximately <strong>135 million barrels<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Russia is facing growing difficulties not only in refining the oil it produces but also in selling it abroad. As demand weakens, loaded tankers are spending extended periods at sea waiting to unload their cargo. Following strikes on its oil refineries, Moscow has attempted to maximize crude oil exports. However, the volume of shipments now [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27339,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54,53],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27338","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27338","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27338"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27338\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27343,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27338\/revisions\/27343"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}