Diesel shipment arrives to boost Kingdom’s strategic stock of oil derivatives

AMMAN — Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Hala Zawati on Thursday announced the arrival of a ship loaded with 50,000 tonnes of diesel, the first shipment under a tender to enhance the strategic stock of oil derivatives in the Kingdom.

The shipment will be stored in Amman's strategic terminals belonging to the Jordan Oil Terminals Company (JOTC) in the Madounah area in the centre of the Kingdom, according to an Energy Ministry statement.

Zawati said in a statement that a shipment of gasoline, amounting to 30,000 tonnes under the tender, will arrive during the first week of June.

These shipments will work to increase the strategic stock in Amman's terminals by 24 per cent, she added.

According to Zawati, the implementation of preserving the necessary stock follows Royal directives.

In this regard, she added, the Cabinet instructed the JOTC to launch a competitive tender to purchase quantities of essential oil derivatives in order to take advantage of the low global oil prices to raise the Kingdom’s strategic stock according to the capacities of the company’s storage terminals in Madounah.

The quantities imported were determined by the available capacities of the oil terminals, which amounted to 20,000 tonnes of gasoline 90, 10,000 tonnes of gasoline 95 and 50,000 tonnes of diesel, Zawati said.

The minister explained that “no jet fuel or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) have been imported”, as the stock is at full capacity.

For her part, JOTC Director General Kholoud Mahasneh stated that the company referred the tender on May 5, 2020 to the bidders who submitted the best prices.

This move will lead to an enhanced utilisation of the storage capacities available in Madounah, which will in turn increase the level of stock efficiencies in the Kingdom, thereby boosting Jordan’s ability to deal with emergencies and ensuring the security of the oil derivatives supply, she said.

Mahasneh noted that the strategic stock is used “only when needed or in cases of emergency”, while the operational stock maintained by oil sector companies supplies the market on a daily basis.

Amman’s strategic terminals in Madounah affiliated to the JOTC, a company wholly owned by the government, were established for the purpose of providing storage capacities for oil derivatives and enhancing the security of the oil derivatives supply, which is one of the main goals of the comprehensive strategy for the energy sector that the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources is cooperating to implement.

The Kingdom’s oil derivatives stock at all storage terminals, whether governmental or private, can last from two to six months, depending on the type of product and the average daily consumption.

The Maduonah area terminals, which were opened in 2019, have a total capacity of 360,000 tonnes.

These terminals consist of six tanks for diesel, each with a capacity of 34,000 tonnes for a total capacity of 204,000 tonnes; and four tanks for gasoline, each with a capacity of 34,000 tonnes for a total capacity of 136,000 tonnes.

The terminals also include two tanks for gasoline 95 with a capacity of 18,000 tonnes each for a total capacity of 36,000 tonnes, and two tanks for aircraft fuel, each with a capacity of 22,000 tonnes for a total capacity of 44,000 tonnes.

They also include five tanks for LPG, each with a capacity of 2,000 tonnes for a total capacity of 10,000 tonnes, in addition to three LPG tanks under construction, which will bring the total number to eight.

The cost of building the Amman strategic terminals in Madounah was about $189 million, and it was funded by a generous grant of $210 million from the United Arab Emirates / Abu Dhabi Fund for Development.

Prime Minister Omar Razzaz had opened the JOTC terminals in June 2019 in the presence of the Director of the Abu Dhabi Fund for Development, the UAE Ambassador and a number of ministers, MPs and local community members, according to the statement.