MOL restarts Dunai refinery, but still a long way from the end of petrol chaos in Hungary

Oil and gas company MOL has restarted its Dunai refinery in Százhalombatta after a period of maintenance, but it will take several weeks to reach full capacity, and supply glitches “won’t be resolved overnight”, MOL’s managing director, György Bacsa, told public radio on Tuesday.

MOL’s total capacity is not sufficient to satisfy Hungarian market demand, 30 percent of which must be imported, he said. If current logistical overload is to be successfully tackled, he added, MOL’s retail and wholesale partners must do more to help resolve current shortages.

Demand for petrol in the past week was double last year’s level, while for diesel it was 1.5 times as much, Bacsa said. Demand for delivery topped daily capacity to deliver by 30 percent, while at the same time imports have dropped heavily.

“We will bring Mol’s machine to its peak, but even this will not make up for what is currently missing: the 30 per cent drop in imports, which is currently making the situation of motorists, petrol station attendants, small wells and large filling stations completely impossible. We’re struggling to catch up,”

the company’s managing director said.

“About 70 of our stations — a quarter of the entire network — are totally dry,”

he added.

According to Index, domestic experts see the suspension of the official price as the solution to the fuel shortage. The secretary general of the Hungarian Petroleum Association (Magyar Ásványolaj Szövetség) recently said:

I believe that restrictions today are causing more damage than price increases have caused in the past.”