The ongoing energy crisis in Europe is expected to benefit Reliance Industries and Nayara Energy as these are among the Asian refiners that produce winter-specification diesel for the European Union, according to a report.

State-owned oil companies are not into exports and that gives an advantage to Reliance — the largest importer of Russian crude and also the largest exporter of diesel from the country — and Russia’s Rosneft-owned

Nayara.

 The energy crisis will only get further aggravated going forward as from next month Opec’s 2-million barrel per day production cut comes into force, and from February 5 the ban on Russian imports of refined products comes into force, say oil analysts at LSG group’s market data provider Refinitiv.

 According to them, since the war began in Ukraine, Reliance and Nayara have imported almost 10 times more Russian crude from the pre-invasion levels, at 2.82 million tonnes per month during March-September.

 Already, Indian exports to Europe have been northward after Russia invaded Ukraine late February. 

Indian refiners have taken advantage of the strong diesel margins after the invasion and raised their exports to Europe, averaging at 7,30,000 tonnes per month, or 21 per cent of their total exports of 2.64 million tonnes/month, that peaked at 1.1 million tonnes in March against the pre-invasion period average of 5,70,000 tonnes per month, the analysts

said.

 Domestic refiners have been averaging at 99.86 per cent of their 5.14 million barrel per day (bpd) capacity since the war as against the pre-war average of 94.26 per cent.