Saudi Aramco said to sell crude oil cargo from Okinawa

Saudi Arabian Oil Co, the world’s biggest oil exporter, sold the first crude cargo from its new storage facility on Japan’s southern Okinawa island, three people with direct knowledge of the transaction said.

Aramco, as the state oil company is known, sold a cargo of heavy-grade Khafji crude from an Aframax-size tanker that can carry 650,000 barrels, to an Asian refiner in the spot market, the people said, asking not to be identified as the transaction is confidential. The shipment was received at the Okinawa terminal on Feb 23, they said.

The Homam Star, a very large crude carrier owned by Aramco, was located about 1.6 km from Okinawa on Feb 23, according to transmissions captured by AISlive on Bloomberg. It’s draft indicated it was laden and the data showed it had come from Ras al Khafji, a port in Saudi Arabia.

Japan and Aramco agreed last year to lease the idle tanks in Okinawa, giving the oil company better access to Asian markets. The terminal is located a few days away from key Asian markets, including Japan, China, South Korea and Taiwan.

The facility, which has a storage capacity of 600,000 kiloliters, or 3.8 million barrels, was leased to Aramco for commercial use, according to the statement on the trade ministry’s website. The country, which depends on about 30 percent of its oil supplies from Saudi Arabia, will get priority supply of crude from the terminal when supply disruption occurs.