Kuwait halted early April the Shuaiba refinery, which will decrease the Kuwaiti oil supply and lead the country to import fuel oil until the opening of Al-Zour refinery in 2019, reported Arab Times.

Kuwait National Petroleum Company’s CEO, Mohammad Ghazi al-Mutairi, stated to reporters that the country “will need to import fuel oil to meet electricity generation needs for about a year,” informed Times of India.

Mutairi further said that the Kuwaiti power generation requires as much as 120,000b/d of fuel oil in summer and 70,000b/d in winter.

The Shuaiba refinery produces around 200,000b/d of oil. Its closure will cause the Kuwaiti production to decline by 250,000 tons/d of oil.

One of the fuel oil traders in Kuwait said that “the shutdown won’t have a huge impact on Arabian Gulf (fuel oil) supplies but it will reduce overall regional flows.

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Meanwhile, Kuwaiti Oil Minister, Essam Al-Marzouq, also announced that Kuwait will further need to import gasoline until the country starts production from Al-Zour refinery.