Indonesia's Pertamina expects to import up to 250 Mbpd of crude oil in 2018
JAKARTA (Reuters) — Indonesia's Pertamina expects to import up to 250 Mbpd of crude oil in 2018, the head of the state-owned company's procurement unit said on Tuesday.
From Indonesia's crude output of around 800,000 bpd, about 500,000 bpd currently goes to Pertamina's domestic refineries, Toto Nugroho, Senior Vice President of the firm's Integrated Supply Chain unit, told reporters.
"Around 250,000 (bpd) is imported," he said, noting that this level would continue in 2018, with imports meeting some 40% of Indonesia's crude oil needs.
Pertamina's existing overseas crude processing deal with Sinopec subsidiary Unipec is due to expire at the end of this month, Nugroho said. Pertamina is waiting for certainty on crude output cuts by OPEC member Iraq, from which it takes a share of Basra crude, before making a new deal, he added.
"How far they will cut, we don't know yet," Nugroho said, adding that there was a possibility Pertamina would sign a new crude processing deal in the second half of 2018.
Pertamina's gasoline imports are expected to be at around 9 MMbbl per month in 2018, Nugroho said, roughly half of which would be RON88 gasoline and half RON92 gasoline.
The company is expecting to import around 6.8 MMt of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) in 2018, Nugroho said.
Pertamina jet fuel imports are expected to climb to around 1 MMbbl per month in 2018 from around 800,000 bbl per month this year "because our demand is good from the aviation sector", Nugroho said.
Pertamina hopes to supply around 90% of its import needs through term contracts, with the rest through spot market deals, Nugroho said.
"We only buy products on the spot market if there's an emergency," he said.
Reporting by Wilda Asmarini; Writing by Fergus Jensen; Editing by Joseph Radford
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