Production of fuel oil plummets across the EU

Whitegate oil refinery in East Cork is Ireland's only crude oil refinery. Photo: Denis Scannell

The production of environmentally damaging fuel oil has fallen 62% across the EU in the past 30 years, data show.

According to data from the European Commission's data analysis arm, Eurostat, over the past decade alone, the production of fuel oil in the EU dropped significantly. In 2020, 48,500 kilotons (kt) of fuel oil were produced, representing a 62% drop compared with 1990 levels, it said.

Fuel oil, as defined by the Encyclopedia Britannica, comes from residues from crude-oil distillation. It is used primarily for steam boilers in power plants, aboard ships, and in industrial plants, it says.

Eurostat said there are concerns over the environmental impact of its use since most of the sulphur that it contains ends up in the atmosphere when combusted in a ship’s engine. In light of these concerns, efforts to limit pollution from ship transport came into force in January 2020, whereby ships can now only use fuel oil with a low sulphur content, Eurostat added.

According to a paper published in Nature Communications in 2018, shipping industry pollution led to 400,000 premature deaths each year, as well as contributing to millions of cases of childhood asthma.

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Five EU countries produced around 60% of total fuel oil in 2020. Most fuel oil in the EU is used to power ships engaged in international navigation, Eurostat said.

"Between 1990 and 2020, all 21 member states that were still producing fuel oil in 2020 reported a decline in production. The most significant decreases in output were observed in Italy and Spain."

The production of fuel oil, as a proportion of the amount of crude oil refinery intake, varies across the EU, with a maximum of 29% for Ireland and a minimum of 1% for Romania in 2020. Whitegate oil refinery in East Cork is the nation's only one, while some member states such as the Netherlands have several refineries with different specialisations, according to Eurostat.

Luxembourg, Latvia, Malta, and Estonia have never had any refineries, while Cyprus and Slovenia stopped producing fuel oil in 2004 and 2000, respectively.

🛢️⛽ In 2020, 48 500 kilotons (kt) of fuel #oil were produced in the #EU, representing a 62% drop compared with 1990 (127 000 kt).

The biggest decreases in output in:
🇮🇹 Italy (23 700 kt in 1990 to 5 400 kt in 2020)
🇪🇸 Spain (15 000 kt to 2 400 kt)
👉https://t.co/960Dg53ah3 pic.twitter.com/dzmcCljG9D

— EU_Eurostat (@EU_Eurostat) October 13, 2021

"In 2019, EU member states imported about 40,000 kt of fuel oil, of which almost 25,000 kt were coming from other EU countries and around 15,000 kt were imported from countries outside the EU (40.4% from Russia, 16.3% from the UK and 11.5% from Norway). 

"In 2019, member states exported about 45,000 kt of which 25,000 kt were sent to other EU countries and 20,000 kt were exported to countries outside the EU (19.8% to the US, 16.7% to the UK and 16.6% to Saudi Arabia," Eurostat said in its analysis.

The Netherlands, Spain, Belgium, France, and Denmark accounted for nearly 75% of the imports of the EU. 

"Fuel oil is either used in industry (3,450 kt in 2019) for processing heat generation etc, but also in the transformation sector (5,700 kt in 2019 for power plants) to generate electricity and heat and in the transport sector for domestic navigation (coastal shipping, inland waterways etc)," Eurostat said.

However, by far the biggest amount of fuel oil is used to power ships engaged in international shipping, it said. "Fuel oil used for this purpose is stored in international maritime bunkers and amounted to 35,000 kt in 2019."