Ukraine’s Drone War Is Choking Kazakhstan’s Oil Exports
India Targets Five Small Modular Reactors by 2033 Natalia Katona is a freelance commodity analyst, based in the United Arab Emirates.
Kazakhstan should, in theory, be one of the major beneficiaries of Russia’s growing isolation from global energy markets.
Its crude is unsanctioned and European refiners need alternatives to Russian barrels.
Yet instead of gaining a clear geopolitical advantage, Kazakhstan has found itself exposed to many of the same risks as its northern neighbour: attacks on export infrastructure, disruptions inside Russia and repeated operational failures at its own largest fields.
The roots of that vulnerability lie partly in geography and partly in the regional energy system Kazakhstan inherited from the USSR.
The Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) is the most important example.
The pipeline was conceived and built after the collapse of the Soviet Union to provide the giant Tengiz field and other western Kazakh producers with direct access to international markets.
It carries crude more than 1,500 kilometres from Kazakhstan to a dedicated Black Sea terminal near Novorossiysk (Russia), following the shortest and most economical route from the Caspian production basin to the sea.
CPC exports averaged about 1.7 million b/d in the last 3 months, including around 1.42 million b/d to Europe and 280,000 b/d to Asian buyers.
Overall, that stands for 80% of total Kazakh crude exports.
Such a concentration could be efficient in normal conditions but dangerous in a crisis - when CPC stops, Kazakhstan does not lose one export route among many; it loses the backbone of its oil trade.
The war in Ukraine has made that dependence increasingly dangerous.
| Product | Price | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Brent Crude | $102.14/bbl | +0.34% |
| WTI Crude | $96.90/bbl | +0.21% |
| EN590 Diesel | $846/MT | +0.18% |
| Jet Fuel A-1 | $1090/MT | +0.55% |
| Mazut M100 | $450/MT | -0.15% |
| Bitumen 60/70 | $470/MT | +0.08% |
| Sulphur Gran 99.5% | $470/MT | -0.44% |
| Urea 46% Gran | $650/MT | +1.12% |
| NPK 16-16-16 | $460/MT | -0.28% |
| Nat Gas TTF | $15.42/MMBtu | +0.92% |
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