Western European oil pipelines

The integrity and reliability of cross-country oil pipelines is vital to the European economy. One quarter of Europe’s refineries are situated inland and depend entirely on pipelines for their crude oil feedstocks. Major oil fields in Russia and the North Sea use cross-country pipelines to export their productions.

Currently, European pipelines transport some 350 Mt/a of crude oil (more than 50% of the EU-15 consumption) and 180 Mt/a of oil products (one-third of the EU-15 demand and a majority of the long distance transportation requirement) over an average distance of 250 km and 200 km respectively.