Crude Oil Trade to 2025: Russia Stuck with Europe

ESAI Energy has forecast global crude oil trade flows by country and region to 2025 in their Five-Year Crude Oil Outlook.“ There are no surprises here, but the volumes are pretty striking,” said Sarah Emerson, President of ESAI Energy. “China accounts for more than 1/3 of interregional trade in crude oil. The flow of crude to Asia dwarfs all other trade over the next five years.”

As shown in the following chart, the two crude trade routes that grow the most by 2025 are the Middle East to Asia and the US to Asia. Canada, Latin America and the FSU also grow their crude sales to Asia. African sales to Asia actually decline during this period, but that is, in part, due to the completion of the Dangote refinery.

Surprisingly, the FSU’s sales to Europe rise by more than their sales to Asia as Russia is increasingly boxed out of Asia due to higher Arab Gulf production and downstream investments. “Europe is not a growth market, so Russia may find collaboration with OPEC increasingly unsatisfying,” pointed out Sarah Emerson.