LUKOIL Neftochim Burgas

History

The refinery became operational in 1964 and joined the Lukoil Group in 1999. With some improvements undertaken over the year that refinery has a capacity to process 7 million tonnes a year.

Crude oil arrives by sea to the nearby port terminal of Burgas Rosenetz before being piped to the refinery. In 2011 Lukoil was given a 35 year concession to run the Rosnetz oil terminal.

In November 2021, Competition commission of Bulgaria accused Bulgarian branch of “Lukoil” of abuse of market dominance, due to, despite company`s biggest warehouse and logistics infrastructure on local oil market, Lukoil`s withdrawal to stock oil from other companies at Lukoil taxable warehouses, switched to main oil terminals in Bulgaria as well as to provide access to pipes for transportation of imported oil. In return, “LUKOIL Neftohim Burgas” has brought into focus, that any of the rules on Bulgarian oil market weren`t violated by the company. In 2022, it announced that it could only work with Russian oil grade "Ural". After he managed to avoid the embargo on Russian oil, he produces his fuel at several times lower cost, which he sells now at market prices. The refinery is also under investigation for tax evasion and financial manipulation.

In 2022 Bulgaria managed to obtain an exemption to allow Russian crude oil to be imported for the refinery until December 2024. Certain conditions were made for the concession, including that no crude oil would be shipped out to the EU and no refined oil world be sent outside Bulgaria, except to Ukraine, or for storage. Exports of processed oil has however been made from the refinery, the Seaexpress shipped 40,000 tons to Rotterdam in August 2023, other shipments have used ship-to-ship transfers to hide the source from the ultimate buyer.

In April 2023 Lukoil Bulgaria and Lukoil Neftohim Burgas were fined 195 million Lev (€100m) for abuse of a dominant position on the oil market contrary to national and European competition law.