MOSCOW (MRC) -- Saudi Arabia has restored its oil production to more than 9.9 million b/d and the country has started replenishing some of the crude stocks that were tapped in the immediate wake of the attacks on its key oil facilities, reported S&P Global with reference to the head of Aramco's trading division.
"Our system was able to grow and become healthier as we moved along and by September 25, we were able to restore all the capacity we had before the attack," the president and CEO of Aramco Trading Co., Ibrahim al-Buainain, told an industry banquet in Fujairah.
"On the 25th we reached the (9.9 million b/d) target, actually. Most of you are aware we have spare capacity. So we are actually a little higher than this," he said.
With production fully restored, Aramo was able to start replenishing some of the inventories that it used in the four or five days immediately after the attack, he said.
Armed drones and missiles attacked Saudi Aramco's largest crude-processing facility at Abqaiq and its key Khurais oil field on September 14 in a strike which initially took some 5.7 million b/d of production offline.
Buainain said "not one single shipment" to any of Aramco's customers were missed or canceled as a result of the attack, proving how resilient Saudi oil infrastructure is.
"Our system was able to grow and become more healthier as we moved along ... it made us more stronger," he said. "The rapid response and recovery of production serves to demonstrate that Saudi Aramco is far more resilient than anyone could have imagined."
As MRC reported earlier, a number of Saudi Arabia's companies, such as Tasnee, Sadara, Advanced Petrochemical and Saudi Kayan, announced a curtailment of feedstock to their petrochemical plants, including polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) facilities, by an average of 30-50% due to the attacks on key Saudi Aramco facilities on Saturday.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polyprolypele (PP).
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 1,255,800 tonnes in the first seven months of 2019, up by 9% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. Meanwhile, the estimated PP consumption in the Russian market was 796,120 tonnes in January-July 2019, up by 11% year on year. Shipments of PP block copolymer and homopolymer PP increased.
MRC