Oil reserves in China have reached record levels amid the escalation in the Middle East. Local oil refiners are not worried about possible disruptions in supplies from the region and are in no hurry to look for alternatives, Bloomberg reported.
The agency cited calculations by the French environmental organization Kayrros, which monitors oil reserves. According to its data, the volumes of oil stored in China have updated their historical maximum, reaching 1.18 billion barrels.
Data from the consulting company Mysteel OilChem show that the rate of oil refining at private refineries in China has fallen to 45%, approaching a three-month minimum. As Sun Jianan, an analyst at the British firm Energy Aspects, noted in a comment to the agency, thanks to large oil reserves, Chinese refiners “will not rush to look for alternative sources to replace Iranian oil“, even if supplies are interrupted.
China is not only the world's largest oil importer, but also a leader in purchasing this raw material from Iran. However, as Michal Meydan, director of the China Energy Research Program at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, told the agency, private refiners in China “have recently been buying less Iranian oil due to secondary sanctions [by the United States]“. They, she said, have also “accumulated reserves and therefore will be able to survive short-term supply disruptions or interruptions“.