Does Europe have more oil than it needs?

The European energy situation has been discussed for a long time. Mostly, the fear of gas and oil shortages in Europe is addressed. As far as gas is concerned, large countries such as Germany report full reservoirs and plenty of it.

Now it seems that European refineries also have more oil than they need. This is primarily because Europe, fearing falling imports from Russia, has tried to get as many shipments as possible from other countries.

More imports are coming from the West and the Middle East

Europe is getting much more oil from the US this year, which is causing a wave of unrest in the United States because of a very export-oriented strategy. On average, 1.1 million barrels per day are being imported from the US this year, up from 800,000 barrels per day last year.

Latin America has also started importing more, with about 313,000 barrels per day imported, up from 132,000 barrels per day last year. In July, we even saw a significant departure from that average, with 600 000 barrels per day imported.

EU flag close-up against the background of an oil pump

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Oil imports from Iran are also gradually increasing. Iraqi oil imports to Europe from July to November are 20% higher than in the same period last year. We informed you about the state of Iran’s oil exports in an earlier article dealing with US sanctions.

Will the situation get worse?

The current situation with more oil and lower demand is also due to other events in Europe. These include several weeks of strikes at French refineries and the subsequent maintenance surge at refineries as output has slowed.

So merchants have increased their purchases partly because of the uncertainty from the ban on Russian oil imports. This ban is due to come into effect on December 5. This means that Europe should not have a problem with oil until at least 5 December. How the market in Europe will look after 5 December remains to be seen.