Turkey’s Ceyhan oil terminal, Iraq’s KRG pipeline halted after quake

A major earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria early on Monday has halted operations at Turkey’s oil terminal in Ceyhan and flows via Iraq’s northern oil export pipeline from Kirkuk.

Turkish pipeline operator BOTAS said there was no damage on main pipelines which carry crude oil from Iraq and Azerbaijan to Turkey. An emergency meeting will take place on the issue, the Tribeca shipping agency said.

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In a notice, Tribeca said ports in southeastern Turkey are affected by the quake and that delays in operations are reported.

Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has halted flows through the pipeline which runs from Iraq’s northern Kirkuk fields to Ceyhan, the region’s ministry of natural resources (MNR) said on Monday.

The KRG had been pumping 400,000 barrels per day (bpd) and Iraq’s federal government was pumping 75,000 bpd through the pipeline, an oil industry source told Reuters.

Oil exports will resume after a “careful inspection of the pipelines is finalized,” an MNR statement said.

Most upstream oil producers have several days of storage capacity, so KRG production should continue in the near term, the oil industry source added.

Azerbaijan

Regarding Azeri crude flows to Turkey, two sources said there was no damage at the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) terminal, but one of the sources added that inspections would take place over the next 1-2 days.

There is sufficient storage capacity in Ceyhan and in Baku, and flows could be reduced if needed, the second source said.

The eastern Mediterranean terminal of Ceyhan is some 155 km (96 miles) from the area of the quake’s epicentre.

The magnitude 7.8 quake struck southern Turkey and northwest Syria early on Monday, killing and injuring hundreds as buildings collapsed across the region.

State pipeline operator BOTAS said natural gas flows were halted to Gaziantep, Hatay and Kahramanmaras provinces and some other districts as a result of damage to a gas transmission line.

Residents in northern Iraqi provinces reported feeling a light tremor following the earthquake.

Read more: Another 7.5-magnitude earthquake hits southeast Turkey, felt in Lebanon