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Azeri BTC arriving at Ceyhan is within normal specifications, BP states

Azeri BTC Crude Oil arriving at BTC Ceyhan Terminal in Turkey has returned to its normal specifications, a BP spokeswoman said on Thursday.

Last week, it was discovered that Azeri BTC crude cargoes contained organic chloride. This caused the price differentials between them to reach a record low of four years and caused several days delay in loading, partly due to extra testing each cargo underwent.

The BP spokesperson stated that oil loadings are still being done from Ceyhan tanks containing oil of the right specification, while BP works with Azerbaijan’s Socar in order to manage oil of the wrong specification found in other tanks.

According to Kpler's data, 425,000 barrels of Azeri BTC were loaded daily from Ceyhan between 1-30 July. This is compared to 561,000 bpd that was scheduled for the July loading program.

The exact date of the contamination and the number of cargoes affected are still unknown. Reporting by Robert Harvey, Shadia Nasralla and Kirovan Donovan.

(source: Reuters)