Energy

A fifth of the country’s output, gone in a day

Kazakhstan starts moving oil around a closed route

With loading at the CPC terminal shut for a fifth day, Astana had begun redirecting exports to alternative routes and was assessing its losses, Kommersant reported on 20 July, while the consortium has gone to court against Ukraine over damage it values in billions of roubles. The energy ministry now frames the production cut as a technological necessity: with the terminal’s tanks full, companies trimmed daily volumes to stop the system overflowing.

Tengiz halves its output

Kazakhstan cut oil and gas condensate production on 22 July after export loadings stopped at the CPC terminal, Reuters reported, citing a source: daily output at Tengiz fell to 406,000 barrels from 925,000. The energy ministry confirmed a temporary reduction and said consultations are running with the consortium, shippers and shipowners.

Bishkek lines up fuel from four directions

At a briefing in Bishkek on 21 July the energy minister, Altynbek Rysbekov, named the sources now filling Kyrgyzstan’s tanks: a first consignment dispatched from China by road, Belarusian fuel already arriving by rail, Kazakh fuel oil at 15,000 to 20,000 tons a month, and a tolling arrangement with Uzbekistan. Russia still supplies more than 90% of Kyrgyzstan’s gasoline; in this particular list it appears as the corridor Belarusian fuel travels through.

Novorossiysk stops taking Kazakh oil

The Caspian Pipeline Consortium has stopped accepting Kazakh crude and the terminal’s tanks are full, Reuters reported on Wednesday. Tracking data shows at least two tankers bound for the berths have changed course. There is a measured precedent for what follows: when the terminal was attacked last November, Reuters reported Kazakh output falling about 6% the following month.

The market answers first: charterers flee the CPC water

Foreign shipowners are refusing to send tankers to the CPC terminal after four tankers were hit in four days, Bloomberg reported, and the consortium was expected to stop accepting Kazakh pipeline crude on Tuesday. If intake stays shut into the weekend, Bloomberg’s sources say, Kazakhstan’s producers will have to cut output. The war has traveled the route’s full length, from the berths to the wellhead.

A $25 million refinery signs into Kyrgyzstan’s fuel gap

The cabinet signed an investment agreement on 20 July with the company Central Asian Energy to build and operate a refinery in Kochkor-Ata: $25 million, capacity above 450,000 tons of products a year, with a first stage due by the end of 2026. Construction has already begun.

Uzbekistan’s grid runs a fifth record day

Daily consumption hit 293.4 million kilowatt-hours on 17 July, 7.6% above last summer’s maximum, and the energy ministry counted five consecutive record days through the weekend. On Monday four Tashkent districts were warned of possible short outages; relief arrives with the heat easing from Tuesday.

The protest was answered by the next drone

Loading at the CPC terminal restarted on Sunday evening and stopped again on Monday morning, when a drone hit the tanker NELSA at the mooring where one of Sunday’s two tankers had burned. Twenty-two of the crew were taken off by CPC tugs. A day after Kazakhstan demanded the attacks end, the demand’s market price was set at zero.

The drones reached the tankers loading Kazakhstan’s oil

On 17 and 19 July drone strikes hit three tankers serving the Caspian Pipeline Consortium’s Black Sea terminal, two of them at the loading berths with Tengiz and Kashagan crude aboard. Loading stopped, and on Sunday Kazakhstan’s foreign ministry called the attacks an encroachment on the country’s economic interests, demanded they end and reserved the right to claim damages.

Two lines tripped, and Kyrgyzstan went dark at 40 degrees

Just after 14:00 on Friday, the 220 kV lines running Kara-Balta to Glavnaya and Glavnaya to Shu disconnected at once, and automatic load shedding cut power to most of Bishkek and to districts across four regions at the peak of a 40-degree afternoon. Supply was largely back by late afternoon; the cause of the double trip is being established.

Uzbekistan’s heat emergency goes national

What began as kindergarten closures in Karakalpakstan is now a country-wide footing: all regions have stepped up the watering of trees and greenery on the ecology committee’s orders, closures have spread to Khorezm and parts of Navoi, and Surkhandarya has restricted daytime truck movement. The +44 to +46 warning runs through Friday, and the grid has already set its record.

The region’s fuel importer starts guarding fuel like an exporter

Kyrgyzstan, which buys over 90% of its fuel from Russia, banned the export of gasoline, diesel and crude on Tuesday, indefinitely: the ban runs until the domestic market is fully supplied, or until the EAEU’s common oil market arrives, whichever comes first. The government says it has asked five countries for help and signed fuel contracts with Belarus and China.

Almaty’s winter project is 26% built, and the premier starts naming names

Prime minister Bektenov used Tuesday’s government meeting to threaten the head of Samruk-Energo with personal responsibility if Almaty’s CHP-3 is not finished by year-end. The gas-conversion project stands at 26%. In June the same warning went to the head of the railways, who is now the former head of the railways.

Kazakhstan’s oil windfall lands on a 3.3-million-tonne hole

A day after Brent’s biggest jump in six years, Kazakhstan’s energy minister told the government that first-half output fell 8.4%, to 45.7 million tonnes. The price came from one war; much of the hole came from the other. And the ministry’s patch for it is the one this desk watches for: deferring maintenance.

Oil at $83 pays Kazakhstan and bills its neighbors

Brent settled at $83.30 on Monday, up 9.6% in what CNN called its biggest one-day percentage gain in over six years, after Washington announced a blockade of Iranian ports and Tehran hit two Emirati tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. Crossings through the strait have more than halved. For Central Asia the same price line runs in two directions at once.

Karakalpakstan shuts kindergartens as Uzbekistan braces for +46

Uzhydromet has issued an extreme heat warning for 13 to 17 July, with temperatures up to +44 to +46 and dust storms in places. In Karakalpakstan, the country’s driest region, cities and districts began suspending kindergartens on sanitary officials’ orders. The heat is a weather story for a week and an infrastructure story for longer.

Russia bans all diesel exports, and starts buying fuel itself

Resolution 854 of 8 July extends Russia’s diesel export ban to the producers themselves through 31 July, and deputy prime minister Alexander Novak says the country begins importing fuel this month. For the Central Asian states that run on Russian fuel, the quota survives on paper. The molecules now have a competing buyer.

Orenburg is back to a quarter of its normal intake from Kazakhstan's Karachaganak

Two weeks after a drone strike forced Kazakhstan to cut oil output at its giant Karachaganak field, the Russian plant that processes its gas is still running far below capacity. Kazakh officials say Orenburg is taking just 28% of its usual volume, and the Caspian Pipeline Consortium is cutting July exports 6% as a result.

Kazakhstan's oil runs through a Russian switch, and a drone just flipped it

Kazakhstan is Central Asia's largest oil producer, yet on 24 June a Ukrainian drone 170 km inside Russia cut its crude output by a quarter at one giant field. Karachaganak's gas is processed in Russia, at a plant Astana does not control, and when that plant burned, Kazakh oil had to stop with it. The region's energy heavyweight commands its own barrels less than its size suggests.