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Saudi sells new crude to Europe amid Libyan outage

London, March 30, 2011

Saudi Arabia has sold European buyers around 2 million barrels of a new crude, blended to compensate for lost Libyan barrels, a source at state-run Saudi Aramco said.

'We have just sold three cargoes in total to replace Libyan oil: two cargoes to OMV and one cargo to BP,' the source said, adding the total volume was around 2 million barrels for March-loading.

'We have more volume that will be available in April,' the source said.

In February, Saudi Arabia, Opec's leading producer, said it would increase output to make up for the disruption of oil from fellow Opec member Libya, where a violent revolution has pitted rebels against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

Saudi Arabia's output has risen to around 9 million bpd, roughly 1 million bpd above its OPEC output target, but traders voiced doubt that Saudi's mostly high sulphur, or sour, crude would be an adequate substitute for Libyan easy-to-refine, light, sweet oil.

The Aramco source said the state oil company had developed a special new blend.

The API gravity of the new blend, which is unnamed, is between 41 and 44 and its sulphur content is 0.5-0.8 percent, which puts it into a category of light and sweet crude.

The price for the crude sales were decided bilaterally and confidential. The sources of the new blend was not disclosed.

Austrian oil firm OMV said it was buying more crude oil from Saudi Arabia, Kazakhstan and the Black Sea region to make up for the lost Libyan barrels. But it said it would not comment on specific cargoes.

'The absence of crude oil from Libya can be fully compensated by crude from other regions,' spokeswoman Michaela Huber said. 'In addition to long-term supply contracts, we also make spot purchases on the open market.'

Saudi Arabia sells five key crudes: Arab Super Light, Extra Light, Light, Medium and Heavy. The Super Light crude is sold only to South Korea and Japan.-Reuters




Tags: Crude | Supply | Sauri Arabia |

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