South Sudan unable to restart Dar Blend crude exports

South Sudan is unable to restart exports of its heavy sweet Dar Blend crude grade because of fighting around war-torn Sudan's Khartoum refinery, oil ministry undersecretary William Anyak Deng told Argus.

Problems along the Petrodar pipeline — which passes through the refinery — have prevented around 100,000 b/d of Dar Blend from reaching Sudan's Bashayer export terminal on the Red Sea since February.

Landlocked South Sudan is entirely reliant on Sudan to export its crude and depends on oil sales for more than 90pc of government revenues. Sudan has been enveloped in a bloody civil war since April 2023, pitting the army against the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

"The major repair work to the pipeline has been done, but we are not able to restart flows due to intense fighting around the Khartoum refinery," Deng said, adding that this was obstructing remaining work. He was unable to give a timeline for a restart.

South Sudan had been hoping to restart the pipeline earlier this month. Its closure has forced DPOC, the Chinese-led consortium that produces Dar Blend, to shut down output due to a lack of alternative export outlets.

Production of South Sudan's medium sweet Nile Blend crude grade has not been impacted, as it is transported to Bashayer through a different pipeline, which remains online.

Deng put Opec+ member South Sudan's current crude output — all of which is Nile Blend — at 60,000-65,000 b/d, compared with around 150,000 b/d before the closure of the Petrodar pipeline.

The restart of the pipeline and the viability of South Sudan's remaining exports are increasingly tied to the trajectory of Sudan's civil war. But efforts to end the fighting have so far failed.

Sudan's 100,000 b/d Khartoum refinery, which was partly supplied with crude by South Sudan, has been repeatedly bombed since the start of war and remains offline. Deng said South Sudan does not have a full assessment of the state of the refinery but understands that some of its crude and fuel tanks have been destroyed.

Sudan has crude production of its own, which is typically around 50,000 b/d and mostly feeds into the Nile Blend stream, but it too has been affected by the civil war. Argus assessed Sudan's crude output at 20,000 b/d in May.

By Aydin Calik