40% of Russia's Oil Export Capacity Is Offline — The Most Severe Supply Disruption in Modern Russian History

The Numbers

According to Reuters calculations based on market data, at least 40% of Russia's crude oil export capabilities — or approximately 2 million barrels per day — were shut as of Wednesday, March 25, 2026. Reuters described this as "the most severe oil supply disruption in the modern history of Russia, the world's second largest oil exporter." (Source: Reuters, March 25, 2026)

The disruptions affect three separate channels simultaneously:

• Baltic Sea ports (Primorsk and Ust-Luga): Both ports were again suspended after a second drone attack this week triggered fires and infrastructure damage. At least 50 vessels are currently waiting offshore in the Gulf of Finland listing Primorsk or Ust-Luga as their destination, according to ship-tracking data from MarineTraffic cited by The Moscow Times.
• Black Sea port (Novorossiysk): The Novorossiysk oil terminal, which can handle up to 700,000 barrels per day, has been loading oil below plan since suffering damage from a heavy Ukrainian drone attack earlier this month. (Source: Reuters)
• Druzhba pipeline: The Druzhba pipeline — which runs through Ukraine to Hungary and Slovakia — has been effectively halted since late January, after Ukraine reported it was damaged by Russian strikes. Both Slovakia and Hungary demanded Kyiv restart the supplies. (Source: Reuters; The Moscow Times)
• Tanker seizures: Frequent seizures of Russia-related tankers in Europe have disrupted approximately 300,000 barrels per day of Arctic oil exports flowing from the port of Murmansk, according to traders cited by Reuters. A French navy seizure of a suspected Russian tanker flying a false flag was reported in the Mediterranean on March 20.

What Ukraine Is Hitting and Why

Ukraine has intensified drone attacks on Russia's oil and fuel export infrastructure throughout March 2026, hitting all three of Russia's major western oil export ports. Kyiv has stated that its goal is to diminish Moscow's oil and gas revenue — which accounts for approximately one-quarter of Russia's state budget proceeds — and thereby weaken Russia's military capacity. (Source: Reuters, March 25, 2026)

Russia's oil output is described by Reuters as one of the main sources of revenue for the national budget and is central to Russia's approximately $2.6 trillion economy. (Source: Reuters, March 25, 2026)

The smoke from the fire at Ust-Luga — which has 33 fuel storage tanks with a total capacity exceeding 500 rail tank cars — was visible from Finland, stretching for dozens of kilometers along the Gulf of Finland coastline, according to Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat, cited by The Moscow Times. (Source: The Moscow Times, March 25, 2026)

Russia has characterized the Ukrainian strikes as terrorist attacks and has tightened security infrastructure across the country. (Source: Reuters, March 25, 2026)

What Russia Still Has Running

Not all Russian oil exports are offline. Reuters reported that Russia continues uninterrupted supplies via pipelines to China, including the Skovorodino-Mohe and Atasu-Alashankou routes, as well as ESPO Blend exports by sea via the port of Kozmino. Together, those three routes account for approximately 1.9 million barrels per day.

Russia also continues loading oil from its two far eastern Sakhalin projects, shipping approximately 250,000 barrels per day from Sakhalin Island. It is also supplying refineries in neighboring Belarus with approximately 300,000 barrels per day. (Source: Reuters, March 25, 2026)

With its westward export routes under sustained attack, Moscow is increasingly dependent on Asian markets — primarily China — but those routes face capacity limitations, according to traders cited by Reuters.

The Double Squeeze: Russia and Iran Simultaneously

The timing of Russia's oil export disruption coincides with — and compounds — the Strait of Hormuz blockade imposed by Iran since February 28. The two supply shocks are happening in parallel:

• Iran's effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz has removed approximately 20 million barrels per day from accessible Middle East producers, according to Reuters reporting from the CERAWeek conference (March 24, 2026)
• Russia's western export disruption has removed approximately 2 million additional barrels per day from global markets

These disruptions are occurring against the backdrop of oil prices that already exceed $100 per barrel due to the Iran war, according to Reuters' own reporting. The Russian export disruption adds new upward pressure to a market already under severe stress. (Source: Reuters, March 25, 2026)

Russia is the world's second largest oil exporter. Iran is the world's third or fourth largest producer (ranking varies by source and methodology). Both are simultaneously constrained — Iran by active military conflict, Russia by targeted infrastructure attacks — meaning two of the world's largest producers are effectively partially or mostly offline at the same time.

Historical Context: What 40% Means

Reuters explicitly characterized the current disruption as "the most severe oil supply disruption in the modern history of Russia." For scale:

Russia exported approximately 4.8 million barrels of crude oil per day in 2025, according to Reuters reporting on February 27, 2026, citing Russia's Deputy Prime Minister (238 million tons in 2025, "broadly on par" with 240 million tons or 4.8 million barrels per day in 2024). A 40% disruption to that baseline equals approximately 1.9–2 million barrels per day — consistent with Reuters' own calculation of "around 2 million barrels per day." (Sources: Reuters, March 25, 2026; Reuters, February 27, 2026)

For comparison: the 1973 Arab oil embargo removed approximately 4 million barrels per day from global markets over several months. The 2022 disruption from Western sanctions on Russian oil after the Ukraine invasion was estimated at 2–3 million barrels per day over a sustained period. The current Russian disruption is occurring on top of — not instead of — the Iran/Hormuz crisis, which is orders of magnitude larger than either historical precedent.

Note: Ranked has not independently verified Russia's current total oil export baseline figure from a primary source. The 40% and 2 million bpd figures come from Reuters calculations based on market data, as cited. Reuters is the primary source for this analysis.

Why It Matters

The significance of this story extends beyond the Russia-Ukraine conflict. The global oil market is experiencing simultaneous supply shocks from two of its largest producers — shocks with entirely different causes (military conflict in the Middle East; infrastructure targeting in a separate European conflict), but with compounding effects on global energy prices and supply.

Energy markets were already in crisis before Wednesday's Reuters report. The CERAWeek consensus earlier this week was that emergency measures — strategic reserve releases, rerouted pipelines, waived sanctions — were insufficient to cover even the Iran/Hormuz disruption alone. Adding 2 million barrels per day of Russian export disruption to that picture further narrows the global supply buffer.

For countries dependent on Russian oil — particularly Hungary and Slovakia, which rely on Druzhba pipeline flows — the disruption creates an immediate supply problem independent of the Iran war. Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has been one of the most vocal opponents of Western sanctions on Russia; his country now faces the practical consequence of the conflict regardless of political alignment.

Ukraine's strategy is explicitly documented: degrade Russia's oil revenue to constrain its military budget. Whether that strategy is working depends on metrics not yet available — Russia's actual budget deficit, its reserve drawdown rate, and its ability to redirect eastern exports. What is documented is the physical fact: as of Wednesday, 40% of Russia's western export infrastructure is offline, and global markets have approximately 2 million fewer barrels per day available than they did a month ago, on top of the approximately 20 million daily barrel shortfall from Hormuz.