The first cargo of Nigeria’s newest crude grade, Anyala, is on its way to Northwest Europe.
S&P Global Platts, which provides benchmark prices for commodity markets around the world, reported this on Monday, quoting trading and shipping sources.
The report said the first export cargo is likely to travel from Fos-sur-Mer to the Cressier refinery in Switzerland through the SPSE pipeline.
Anyala is Nigeria’s newest oil development since the start-up of the giant Egina field in late 2018.
S&P Global Platts quoted data intelligence firm, Kpler, as saying that Aframax Minerva Clara loaded a 700,000-barrel stem of Anyala crude from the Abigail-Joseph floating production, storage and offloading vessel on January 10, and the tanker is on its way to the Fos-sur-Mer terminal located at France’s Mediterranean port of Marseille.
It said Vitol had chartered the tanker as it has a stake in indigenous producer FIRST E&P, which is the operator of the Anyala west oil fields, located in the shallow waters of the Niger Delta.
There are indications that a second cargo will load in March, with some Asian refiners already showing buying interest.
Anyala has been labelled a medium sweet crude grade similar in quality to Nigeria’s flagship crude Bonny light.
Industry experts say that when refined, Anyala will produce a high yield of middle distillates making it attractive to both simple and complex refineries.
The new crude is from Nigeria’s shallow-water Anyala west oil fields which struck first oil in November. Although the final investment decision on the project was made in July 2018, the first oil was initially expected in 2019.
The 68,000 b/d Cressier is operated by Varo Energy, a joint venture between Vitol, private equity fund, Carlyle Group, and private investment fund, Reggeborgh.
Since the coronavirus pandemic disrupted the global oil market, Nigeria’s oil output has fallen sharply.
Worse still, having come under pressure to adhere to OPEC+ cut obligations, Nigeria’s key grades like Qua Iboe, Forcados and Brass river have also recently faced outages.
