A new report from S&P Global Market Intelligence reveals the extent of the dark fleet delivering sanctioned Russian crude oil and oil products
The dark fleet has become the accepted shorthand for tankers carrying crude oil and oil products from producer countries that have been sanctioned by the West.
A small number of tankers have always been involved in smuggling oil but the sanctions imposed on Iran and Venezuela codified the fleet.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has taken the use of tankers to evade of sanctions to a new level. S&P Global Market Intelligence (S&PGMI) has published a paper analysing the tactics and methods employed by Russian and non-Russian vessels to elude restrictions.
The report pinpoints the G7 oil price cap announced in September 2022 as a key date and uses the sale of vessels sold with missing ownership entities or having an unknown or undisclosed buyer since August 2022 as a starting point to identify vessels entering the dark fleet.
It also includes vessels previously working in the Iran or Venezuela trade, vessels making a first port call or ship-to-ship transfer (STS) with Russia after the 5 December 2022 oil price cap, and vessels registered to a Russian entity after that date.
Using these criteria, S&PGMI has identified 443 vessels that fit this profile. This figure is roughly in line with figures given in other reports on the dark fleet and many believe it to be a sufficiently large fleet for Russia to continue to supply crude oil and oil products to its clients.
S&PGMI noted that from a tanker fleet of 9,200 vessels, it has identified 1,900 tankers that are “deemed to be of high or medium risk due to a Russian owner or registration, a Russian port call or an STS engagement in Russian waters or with a Russian related entity.”
The report highlights some of the outstanding features of the dark fleet’s activities, including owner domicile of the tankers, flag states, STS hubs, and new routes to market for Russian diesel.
Of the tankers visiting Russian ports for the first time in 2023, over 60 vessels are recognised as having a Greek-domiciled owner. Greece forms the largest group of owners, followed by “unknowns”, Turkey and China.
Regarding flag states, as might be expected, the flag states with the largest tanker fleet are prominent, with Liberia, Marshall Islands and Panama forming the most popular. But, S&PGMI points out, certain flags have experienced growth alongside the dark fleet.
In 2018, only one tanker was registered to Cameroon. In 2021 and 2022, the Cameroon fleet doubled in size to the current size of 43 vessels, but, as S&PCMI points out, only three of these tankers are fully documented and have transparent ownership.
STS activity has grown since the Russian invasion of Ukraine with the Spanish enclave of Ceuta experiencing a monthly average of 18 STS between October 2022 and January 2023.
The second-growing STS hub was identified by S&PGMI as offshore Greece and the Peloponnese region with tankers from the Black Sea load terminals taking part.
One other development noted by S&PGMI is the growth of diesel imports into Tunisia, which in the first two months of 2023, has imported levels close to the whole of 2022. This is beyond the domestic consumption and suggests Russian diesel is entering Tunisia before being re-exported elsewhere.
The whitepaper can be found here.
The impact of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on the product tanker trade is one of the topics discussed at the International Chemical & Product Tanker Conference in London in April 2023. Book your place here.
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