By Dalga Khatinoglu
The combination of Iran's Custom Administration reports with the official statistics of its Asian buyers indicates that above 35 percent of Iran's exported oil to Asia relies on its natural gas condensate, which is called ultra-light crude oil as well.
Iran doesn't report its monthly crude oil exports and its customers do not separate the amounts of imported Iranian crude oil and condensate volume separately.
However, Iran's Custom Administrations' monthly reports about the country's non-oil exports, including gas condensate, shows a huge share of ultra-light oil in Iran's total crude oil export.
The latest custom report, released on Dec.4, says that Iran has exported about 457,000 barrels per day during last two months, while Reuters reported on Nov.29 that the four of Iran's Asian oil buyers together took in 877,888 bpd of the Islamic republic's crude in October, down 19.1 percent from the month before.
Asia's share in Iran's crude oil export is about 90 percent.
Imports of Iranian oil's four biggest buyers, China, India, Japan and South Korea, have averaged 1.11 million bpd over January-October this year.
However, Iran's custom administration's monthly reports indicate that during a 10-moth period corresponding Jan-Oct, Iran has exported averagely 394,352 bpd of the condensate export, shares above 35 percent of the total crude oil exports.
Iran's fiscal year starts on March 21.
The following figures are extracted from Iranian Custom Administration's monthly reports:
Condensate export |
Volume Kilo metric tons |
Value |
Thousand barrels per day |
Oct 23 to Nov 22 |
1,149 |
$1.018B |
311.34 |
Nov 23 to Dec 22 |
1,690 |
$1.419B |
457.94 |
Dec 23 to Jan 21 |
3,599 |
$2.157B |
975.21 |
Jan 22 to Feb 20 |
1,095 |
$959M |
296.71 |
Feb 21 to Mar 20 |
897 |
$816M |
243.06 |
Mar 21 to Apr 20 |
846 |
$779M |
229.24 |
Apr 21 to May21 |
4,095 |
$2.251B |
1109.61 |
May 22 to June 21 |
807 |
$761M |
218.67 |
June 22 to July 22 |
1,965 |
$1.388B |
532.45 |
July 23 to Aug 22 |
759 |
$678M |
205.66 |
Aug 23 to Sep 22 |
726 |
$657M |
196.72 |
Sep 23 to Oct 23 |
1,616 |
$1.027B |
452.48 |
Oct.23 to Nov.22 |
1,639 |
1.188B |
458.92 |
Edited by CN
Dalga Khatinoglu is an expert on Iran's energy sector, head of Trend Agency's Iran news service
Follow him on @dalgakhatinoglu