Energy Minister: Domestic Refinery's Output Key to Oil Product Supply Security

Dubravka Djedovic Handanovic (BETAPHOTO/Ministarstvo ruradstva i energetike/Nenad Kostic)

Minister of Mining and Energy Dubravka Djedovic Handanovic said on Aug. 5, in a meeting with representatives of the Association of Oil Companies of Serbia and oil company Naftna Industrija Srbije (NIS) on the delivery of oil products in conditions of prolonged low water levels of the Danube, that the situation is challenging and that the output of the domestic refinery (in Pancevo) is key to supply security, the Ministry said in a news release.

According to the minister, the extension of NIS' operating license until Aug. 28 has enabled NIS to keep producing oil derivatives, which is currently of the utmost importance for stable supply to the Serbian market, bearing in mind the difficulties facing oil companies that procure imported fuel.

"We have announcements from NIS that in the second half of the month, which is only when the already ordered deliveries of crude can arrive, it can increase processing from the current roughly 9,500 tons of crude per day to about 13,000 tons per day. As one of the measures, we will enable NIS to put some 23,000 of their operating reserves at the disposal of other oil companies which currently have greater demand from the domestic refinery, which will allow for meeting the enormous demand we expect in August, of around 200,000 tons of oil products," said Djedovic Handanovic.