Germany tries to save its fourth largest refinery, even if it uses RUSSIAN OIL
Germany is considering ways to keep the country's fourth-largest refinery running in an effort to eliminate dependence on Russian oil imports by the end of the year. The refinery, which supplies 90% of the fuel to the capital Berlin, is in fact owned by the Russian Rosneft.
Germany has several options for the Schwedt refinery, which is 54% owned by Rosneft, including expropriation. But German authorities fear retaliation from Russia in the event of expropriation, including those involving cutting off natural gas supplies to Germany, sources familiar with the deliberations told Reuters Tuesday .
Germany is preparing to take control of the Schwedt refinery under a plan that could see raw materials transported through the German Baltic Sea port of Rostock and the Polish port of Gdansk via an alternative pipeline link.
The Schwedt refinery is supplied with Russian crude through the Druzhba pipeline, the same one that serves Hungary, which is currently exempt from the EU embargo on Russian oil imports, which will come into effect later this year. Germany, however, has pledged to eliminate dependence on Russian oil by the end of the year. This means he must procure an alternative supply of crude oil for the Schwedt refinery and figure out how to operate the plant without the current majority owner and operator Rosneft.
The Russian oil giant, however, has so far refused to negotiate with Germany the sale of its stake in the refinery or to discuss other solutions, according to Reuters sources.
Germany has considered the possibility of entrusting Shell, which holds a 37.5% minority stake in Schwedt, with the role of temporary daily operator of the site, but Shell is not interested in taking on a role of permanent operator nor to increase its stake in the refinery, government and corporate sources told Reuters. Shell obviously does not want to carry out such a hostile act towards Rosfnet, with whom, one day, it will find itself doing business again.
Another idea is to make the Polish PKN Orlen refinery a temporary operator of the Schwedt refinery, as it could supply non-Russian crude from Gdansk. But Poland wants Rosneft to be ousted from the refinery before considering a deal to run it, Reuters sources say, which would mean first closing the plant and then giving it to Poland, while making the restart very expensive.
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The article Germany tries to save its fourth largest refinery, even if it uses RUSSIAN OIL comes from ScenariEconomici.it .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/la-germania-cerca-di-salvare-la-sua-quarta-piu-grande-raffineria-anche-se-usa-petrolio-russo/ on Wed, 15 Jun 2022 07:00:50 +0000.