Rotterdam running out of space for crude

29/04/2009

Rotterdam, Europe's largest port, may be running short on storage capacity as stocks of crude, heating oil and other distillates continue to pile up, Bloomberg reports.

Speaking to the news agency, Jeroen Kortsmit, manager for commercial affairs at Royal Dirkzwager, said that many warehouses are already full, with tankers shipping refined products such as heating oil into the port being diverted or forced to drop anchor until space becomes available.

"A lot of tanks are fully loaded," he announced earlier this week.

The news comes as global oil demand registers a back-to-back annual decline for the first time in 25 years.

Consumption of crude and distillates such as gasoline, DERV and heating oil has plummeted since the onset of the financial crisis as industry and manufacturing output falls and global transport slows.

This slump in demand has also weighed heavily on prices of all petroleum products in recent months, although crude has climbed back from a nadir of $35 a barrel in February.