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Irina Slav

Irina Slav

Irina is a writer for Oilprice.com with over a decade of experience writing on the oil and gas industry.

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China Once Again Cuts Oil Import Quotas For Indepedent Refiners

  • Beijing's crackdown on the private refining industry was one reason behind this import decline as the government tackled excessive fuel supply
  • As it tackles teapots, however, Beijing is having trouble securing enough energy supplies for the winter amid soaring gas and coal prices
Refinery

Beijing has cut the crude oil import quotas for independent refiners for the rest of the year in the latest move to curb their growing oil market clout, Reuters has reported, citing industry sources.

According to the report, the latest crude import quotas for independents is 14.89 million tons. This brings the total for the year to 177.14 million tons, which compares with 184.55 million tons for 2020.

This would normally be strongly bearish news for oil. But there is so much going on for the bulls it's likely that the effect of what amounts to a future decline in Chinese oil imports will be temporary.

A total of 16 independent refiners were granted import quotas, with the largest awarded to Hengli Petrochemical. However, the largest private refinery operator, Zhejiang Petrochemical Co, was not granted an import quota for its 800,000-bpd facility.

China's crude oil imports over the first nine months of the year fell by 6.8 percent from the same period of 2020, with September imports alone dropping by more than 15 percent from a year earlier.

Beijing's crackdown on the private refining industry was one reason behind this import decline as the government tackled excessive fuel supply, much of which came from teapots. Allegations of environmental law violations and tax evasion were also leveled against some independent refiners. Additionally, Beijing ordered state-owned refiners to stop trading their import quotas with private peers.

As it tackles teapots, however, Beijing is having trouble securing enough energy supplies for the winter amid soaring gas and coal prices. Orders for boosting domestic coal production have been issued, and China is also ramping up its gas supplies. It is also changing its list of priorities, with decarbonization getting trumped by energy security.

"Energy security should be the premise on which a modern energy system is built, and the capacity for energy self-supply should be enhanced," Premier Li Keqiang said in a statement earlier this week.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

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Leave a comment
  • Mamdouh Salameh on October 15 2021 said:
    We shouldn't read much into this. It is most probably part of China's decision to secure its energy needs at all costs before the onset of winter at a time of growing shortages in the market and rocketing prices.

    Still, I project that China’s crude oil imports will average 12.0-12.5 million barrels a day (mbd) in 2021.

    Dr Mamdouh G Salameh
    International Oil Economist
    Visiting Professor of Energy Economics at ESCP Europe Business School, London
  • DoRight Deikins on October 15 2021 said:
    Everyone who believes that the independent refineries break more environmental laws and are more corrupt that the state refineries line up over there.
  • George Hunter on October 20 2021 said:
    So just throw out 'Teapot' and not explain wtf it is? Brilliant!

Leave a comment




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