To get a clear idea of how things stand now, World Bunkering spoke to Energy Petrol CEO Mustafa Muhtaroğlu.

WB: Turkey’s had to contend with the earthquake in the south of the country and restrictions on oil cargoes from Russia – amongst other things. How has this impacted business, or the normal running of your bunkering operations?

MM: In both the last two years we’ve faced two big issues, both in February: the war near us started on 24.02.2022 and the big disaster earthquake happened on 06.02.2023, both of course affecting us very much.

We lost a huge number of people through the earthquake affecting 10–12 cities with some 13 million people living in them and producing over 10% of Turkey’s GDP. Furthermore, we have large industry there exporting serious amounts which has been interrupted for a while. In the meantime, it will cost us over 100 billion dollars to rebuild the area. I say we have to work more to recover soon.

Turkey does not apply any sanctions but cargo flow is of course very much affected by the current situation since banks are not paying for Russian cargoes. In the meantime, many European bunker traders have stopped supplying ships coming from or going to Russia, which has of course lowered demand.

All of these have very much affected the bunker industry in Turkey.

WB: Is Black Sea traffic still as heavily impacted by the war as it was this time last year, or have things like the grain deal improved matters at all?

MM: The war and the stoppage of Ukrainian ports have affected us very seriously. There used to be over 13,500 ships loading from Ukraine per annum who were our main clients in the Istanbul bunker market. We lost all of them. Lately, some ships are coming under the grain control agreement, but they can never compensate for business we lost.

Turkey is not applying any sanctions to these countries, however it’s of course affecting business flow in the area. The bunker industry has been the most affected area by the war due to the sharp decrease in the number of ships coming from Ukraine. It has been a little bit compensated by increasing traffic from Romania, Bulgaria, the River Danube and Georgia, but it can never create the same bunker demand for Turkey.

Grain corridor ships are bringing some demand but it has its own difficulties due to JCC control so it can never help to recover the demand we lost. Traffic from other ports have gone up, supporting our business, however total volume is dramatically down to 2.25 million tonnes from 2.5 million in 2021 and 3 million in 2018, the largest volume ever.

WB: How is the Turkish sector looking in general now?

MM: It’s quite stable. The market has adapted to the new dynamics, waiting for things to normalise. We are very much looking forward to the end of war and the 2025 SECA application for the Mediterranean Sea.

WB: What do you see, or hope to see, in the coming months?

MM: No big surprises. We will try to overcome this period with minimum losses. Thankfully in the market in general margins are healthy so that we can keep surviving and looking forward to seeing the end of the war.

Meanwhile, Vitol Bunkers has announced that, through its affiliate Petrol Ofisi, it is now offering bunkering services in Turkey to its global shipping customer base. With a fleet of 16 barges, Petrol Ofisi makes more than 3,000 bunker deliveries each year. In a sign of optimism in the future of the country’s bunkering market, the two companies say they are now “working in close alignment to provide bunkering and marine decarbonisation solutions to the world largest container liners, dry bulkers, oil tankers, LNG carriers, car carriers & cruise liners in Turkey”.

Across the Aegean, Greek shipping is also very much looking forward, with many of its biggest players looking to push themselves to the front line of decarbonisation in the years ahead.

At the end of last year, the Union of Greek Shipowners came out in broad favour of the agreed form of the EU’s Emissions Trading System, as it had largely been throughout the development of the ETS, but called for the expansion of measures to cover other parts of the industry, including bunker suppliers. In a statement it said: “The UGS is firmly committed to the decarbonisation of the shipping industry. To this end, it highlights again the importance of committing all the relevant out-of-sector stakeholders to this challenging undertaking. Effective mandatory measures for the other stakeholders, such as fuel producers and suppliers, are also necessary.”

In late March this year, the UGS was similarly positive about the development of the EU Green Deal Industrial Plan, describing shipping’s role in decarbonisation of European industry as “self-evident”.

However, the UGS called for the plan to support alternative fuel development and infrastructure on an equitable basis as a matter of urgency, as well as greater consultation with the shipping industry. “The GDIP must cater for their speedy and sufficient development and supply by out of sector stakeholders. Equally, implementation of the GDIP should not lead to distortion of competition and major inequities among EU Member States,” the UGS said in a statement.

UGS president Melina Travlos continued: “Without shipping there can be neither green transition nor strategic autonomy for the EU. The path to the decarbonisation of our sector must be ambitious but also realistic. This is the absolute minimum to safeguard the international competitiveness and sustainability of EU shipping.”

The Hellenic Decarbonisation Committee, a Greek and Cypriot industry discussion forum with an obvious focus and backed strongly by Italian class society RINA, is focusing more on the immediate term, though. At its most recent meeting, aimed mostly at addressing SEEMP and CII impacts on shipowners, RINA’s deputy marine operations executive vice president Massimo Volta, said: “Decarbonization is not a theoretical exercise. We need feasible solutions in line with the feedback from shipowners, in respect to both the environment and the people involved.”