Oil Market So Glutted Traders Turn to Tiny Barges to Store Fuels
- Barges in Europe’s regional ARA hub being booked to store
- Many on-land storage locations are either full or fully booked
An oil tanker barge in Rotterdam, Netherlands.
Photographer: Jasper Juinen/Bloomberg
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The oil market is getting so glutted that tiny barges that would normally be busily moving fuels around Europe’s petroleum-trading hub are suddenly storing traders’ cargoes instead.
For weeks now, oil and fuel traders have been clamoring for almost any storage facilities they can hire, filling on-land tanks and even ocean-going supertankers. But the deployment of barges -- tiny vessels by comparison -- has taken the hunt for places to stash cargoes to a new dimension.