A man paints the logo of oil refiner Bharat Petroleum Corp (BPCL) on a wall on the outskirts of Kochi, India.
Credit: Reuters Photo
Indian state-run oil refiner Bharat Petroleum Corp has signed a deal with BP to buy 1 million barrels per month of US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude for four months, trade sources said.
BPCL would start taking delivery of the oil from June, they said.
The Indian refiner has also separately bought 2 million barrels of WTI crude for loading in April via a spot tender, the sources said.
BPCL often buys US oil for its three refineries, which have a combined capacity to process 706,000 bpd of crude.
WTI will meet BPCL's low-sulphur crude requirement, one of the sources said, adding the economics and quality of the U.S. crude is better than oil from West Africa and the Mediterranean.
BPCL is expected to process more crude in the next fiscal year starting in April compared with the current year, when it had shut its 156,000 bpd Bina refinery in central India for a month for maintenance. It had also shut units at its 120,000 bpd Mumbai refinery for maintenance.
BPCL did not respond to an email from Reuters seeking comments.