C1 Energy (Shanghai) – Jun 2, 2010 －－－China crude market was still strictly controlled by the government, although the national oil reserve project was recently opened to private enterprises, C1's survey found.
Small or medium-scale enterprises and private ones could just participate as third-parties instead of investors or operators, according to a source in charge of crude import business with a state-owned oil giant. "Although some storage enterprises associated with independent refineries in Shandong Province bid for national oil reserve project, independent refineries still have no access to crude," said the source. Only Sinopec, PetroChina, Sinochem and CNOOC are entitled to import crude for the national petroleum reserve at present, the source added.
As C1 reported earlier, 8 enterprises bid for national petroleum reserve project in Beijing mid-May, with 6 of which allowed to store a combined 1.5-mil mt of crude as national petroleum reserve.
The enterprises winning the bidding each signed with the government a 2-year lease contract, and they shall fill the reserve storages in 180 days starting from May 20, market sources said.
However, the above source in charge of crude import business said there was no instruction from the National Petroleum Reserve Center on injecting crude to tank farms of the private enterprises now.
China is still not yet to promulgate detailed rules for the national petroleum reserve so far, although it has filled the first phase of national strategic petroleum reserve bases with crude. The central government is expected to release the Oil Market Management Measures and the Energy Law this year.
Beijing has agreed to divide the national petroleum reserve into four levels, with the systems of the west and Japan as references, including national strategic petroleum reserve, local petroleum reserve, commercial petroleum reserve of state-owned oil companies and petroleum reserve of small or medium-scale enterprises, according to an official with the National Development & Reform Commission, China's energy watchdog.
The National Petroleum Reserve Center directly under the NDRC established at the end of 2007 is administrator of national petroleum reserve, acting as investor.
China may make use of more oil storages owned by private enterprises as national petroleum reserve gradually, since the second phase of national strategic petroleum reserve would not become operational until 2011-2013, the sources reckoned.
 
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