China’s crude oil imports reached 43.14 million tonnes in October, equivalent to 10.16 million barrels per day (bpd), up 14% from a low base a year earlier in their first annual growth in five months, and up from September’s 9.8 million bpd, customs data showed.
The rebound came as PetroChina started trial production at a 200,000-barrel-per-day crude unit at its newly-built refinery in Guangdong, while privately controlled Shenghong Petrochemical also got ready to officially launch its 320,000-bpd plant in Jiangsu province.
For the first 10 months of the year, China’s crude oil imports totalled 413.53 million tonnes, or about 9.93 million bpd, 2.7% below the corresponding period last year, showed the data.
Natural gas imports via pipeline and in the form of LNG reached 7.6 million tonnes in October, sliding 18.87% from a year earlier and falling 14.03% from the previous month, showed the data.
For the first ten months of the year, China imported 88.74 million tonnes of natural gas, down 10.4% from a year earlier, and the cost of gas imports surged 42.1% from a year earlier, reflecting the spike in global gas prices, showed the data.