Bulgarian lubricant marketer Prista Oil announced last week that it plans to build a terminal for lubricating base oils in the Black Sea port town of Varna. Officials said the company is building the facility to provide flexibility to receive large base oil shipments and to accommodate its growing base oil trading business.
Actually, base oil trading is becoming a core business of Prista, Management Board Deputy Chairman Hristo Savchev told Lube Report. But the most important thing is that this terminal will enable us to load and unload bigger vessels – 12,000 to 15,000 metric tons – thus reducing the cost of freight.
Pristas headquarters is in Sophia, but its blending plant is in Ruse, along Bulgarias northeastern border with Romania, and approximately 150 miles from Varna. In a July 25 announcement, management said it will spend 7 million (U.S. $9.6 million) to construct the terminal on 2.9-hectare site that it owns at the port.
The company said the terminal will have capacity of 50,000 metric tons when it opens in the spring of 2008 but that it will expand to between 150,000 tons and 200,000 tons over the next decade. The facility is designed to receive ships up to 160 meters long and with draughts of up to 8.5 meters.
Savchev said the ability to receive larger shipments is especially important when it comes to deliveries of Group II and Group III stocks, some of which come from the United States.
Prista has two existing base oil terminals – one at another Black Sea port, in Odessa, Ukraine, and the other in Turkey.
In addition to receiving base stocks for its own blending purposes, Prista plans to use the Varna terminal to receive shipments of base oils for resale, andfor other types of materials.