Oil supply to Israel

20 August 2024

Introduction

This supply chain analysis was produced for Oil Change International by Data Desk, building on a previous analysis published in March 2024 and additional work on United States military jet fuel supplies published by SOMO in May 2024.

The aim of this analysis is to provide a reliable accounting of volumes of crude oil, intermediate petroleum products and finished fuels delivered to Israel by sea since the 27 October 2023 invasion of the Gaza Strip.

The data sources used are:

• a model of global seaborne oil and products flows maintained by the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG), based on data from tankers' Automatic Identification Systems (AIS), port schedules, tanker fixtures and other commercial datasets;

• customs data provided through Sinoimex Global Trade Monitor;

• raw AIS data, accessed via LSEG Workspace; and

• satellite imagery from the ESA Sentinel-2 mission.

The data covers shipments discharging between 27 October 2023 and 15 July 2024. A full methodology is provided at the bottom of this document.

Weekly summary

The charts below show shipments of crude oil, fuel oil and refined products to Israel since 27 October 2023, broken down by week of arrival and country of origin. The total volume over the period in kilotonnes (kt) is displayed on the right-hand axis. Hover over a cell to view the weekly volume, which is also indicated by the cell's colour.

Compared with the analysis published in March, new origin countries include Italy (crude and naphtha), Greece (diesel/gasoil) and Congo-Brazzaville (crude). Crude oil shipments whose origin country (i.e. where the oil was actually produced) is listed as 'Unknown' were loaded in the following locations:

• one shipment loaded at the Vasiliko oil storage terminal on Cyprus; and

• one shipment loaded at the northern terminus of the Sumed pipeline in Egypt — Sumed carries oil to the Mediterannean from the Red Sea, with cargoes most often produced by Saudia Arabia, Egypt itself, the United Arab Emirates and Iraq.

Table of shipments

The first table below lists all the shipments that form the basis of the charts in the previous section. It's best viewed on a wide screen.

The second table gives further information on the tankers involved, derived from chartering questionnaires provided by Q88.com.

Example satellite image

Where the AIS data is unclear, shipments included in this analysis have been verified using Sentinel-2 satellite imagery. An example of a satellite image showing a tanker discharge is given below.

Corporate attribution

The shipments listed in this analysis are connected to a range of companies in the global oil and gas industry. Details for the three most significant grades of crude oil by volume are given below, broken down by industry segment.

Upstream

CPC blend crude is a mixture of Kazakh and Russian crude oil from the Caspian Sea and oil from smaller onshore fields in southern Russia. According to the CPC website, the largest share is produced by Tengizchevroil, a joint venture (JV) between Chevron (50%), ExxonMobil Kazakhstan (25%), KazMunayGas (20%) and Lukoil (5%). shows at least one cargo sold directly by Tengizchevroil to Oil Refineries Ltd., the operator of the Haifa refinery.

Azeri BTC crude flows through the Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan pipeline. According to BP, the pipeline's operator, it "carries oil from the Azeri-Chirag-Deepwater Gunashli (ACG) field and condensate from Shah Deniz". ACG's shareholders include BP (30.37%), SOCAR (25.0%), Equinor (7.27%) and ExxonMobil (6.79%). Equinor's stake in ACG is currently being sold.

Gabonese Rabi crude was historically produced by Shell. In 2017, the field — and all Shell's other onshore assets in Gabon — was acquired by Assala Gabon, a vehicle backed by the Carlyle Group private equity firm. In June 2024, these assets were sold back to the Gabonese state.

Midstream

CPC blend crude is first transported through the CPC pipeline, whose shareholders include Transneft (24%) and subsidiaries of Chevron (15%), KazMunayGas (19%) and Italy's Eni (2%). Tanker shipments to Israel since 27 October 2023 have been chartered by KazMunayGas, Petraco, PKN Orlen and Eni. The shipment chartered by PKN Orlen (Flow ID 7486024) was an unusual trade for the company, a Polish refiner which ordinarily only ships its own feedstock and products.

Azeri BTC crude travels through the BTC pipeline, whose shareholders include BP (30.1%), Equinor (8.71%), Eni (5%), TotalEnergies (5%) and ExxonMobil (2.5%). Shipments to Israel in the relevant period were chartered by SOCAR, Vitol, Petraco, Oilmar and Glencore.

No charterer information is available via LSEG for shipments of Gabonese Rabi crude. One shipment from the Dussafu offshore oil field was chartered by Oil Refineries Ltd.

Methodology

LSEG's proprietary Trade Flows model provides an assessment of the seaborne trade in crude oil and refined products based on AIS data, customs data, published information like tanker fixtures and port schedules, and analyst input. Largely automated and aimed at traders and other market participants, the model prioritises timeliness over accuracy and is vulnerable to small errors where parts of its source data are unavailable.

For security reasons, tankers approaching Israel often turn off their AIS transponders for extended periods. Where this happens in the vicinity of a port or anchorage or in a recognised STS transfer zone, this leads the LSEG model to assume that the shipment has been discharged there. This particularly affects the Port Said STS zone, which many tankers pass through on their way to Israel's Mediterranean coast.

To ensure the accuracy of this analysis, Data Desk has used the following methodology, derived by comparing the Trade Flows model with customs data and satellite imagery:

1. Take all shipments recorded in the LSEG Trade Flows dataset to Israeli ports, as well as to the Port Said STS zone (Egypt) and Aqaba (Jordan), which is near the Red Sea port of Eilat.

2. For each shipment terminating in the Port Said STS zone:

• Check that the journey (defined as the interval between the departure date and the assumed arrival date + days) includes a gap in AIS transmissions of at least hours (i.e. a window in which the ship could in fact have delivered its cargo to Israel).

• Check that the tanker's heading was between and degrees at the time of the last AIS 'ping' before the gap and that it was east of degrees longitude (i.e. near Israel and heading nearer).

• Add any shipments chartered by Oil Refineries Ltd. (the owner of the Haifa refinery), even if they don't meet the above criteria.

3. For each shipment terminating in Aqaba anchorage, manually review the track for AIS gaps. If one is found, consult satellite imagery to check if the ship was visible at the Eilat terminal.

4. Combine all shipments that match the criteria above and assign Israel as the destination.