Iran is taking advantage of Libya's turmoil and dwindling exports to sell more crude that it has found difficult to offload due to economic sanctions. Unrest in Libya has slashed a big chunk of its crude oil output of 1.6 million barrels per day (bpd), with estimates of capacity shut down ranging from 500,000 to 1.2 million bpd.
Ahmad Ghalebani, Iranian deputy oil minister, said on Friday Iran had already seen an increase in demand following political upheaval in the Arab world. "Demand for Iran's oil has increased," Iran's semi-official Mehr news agency quoted Ghalebani as saying. Italian oil refiner Saras SpA, traditionally a big buyer of Libyan crude oil, said in a Reuters interview on Friday that it was looking at replacing oil shipments from Libya and had already slightly increased sour crude supplies from Iran.
Saras General Manager Dario Scaffardi said his company was also looking at Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, West Africa, Algeria and the North Sea for possible crude replacements for Libyan oil. The United States has led a drive to isolate Iran through international sanctions and bring it to the negotiating table over its nuclear programme.
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