In brief

  • A new contract sets, for the whole of 2027, the terms on which crude oil, natural gasoline, condensate and ethane travel through the state pipelines. It applies from 1 January 2027 and replaces the framework contract for 2026. Those concerned are Conpet, the only company operating the national transport system, and the firms that hand over products for transport, meaning the refineries and the traders in crude oil, natural gasoline, condensate and ethane.
  • The scheduled shutdown for maintenance no longer reduces the quantity the shipper has undertaken to move. The contract gives the shipper the right to a break of at most 45 calendar days a year, but it now states expressly that the break does not reduce the contracted quantity and does not change the way the penalties are calculated. If the programme is spread evenly, 45 days means 12.33% of the annual quantity, while the tolerance below which no damages are due is only 10%, the equivalent of 36.5 days.
  • The damages for quantities not handed over move from euro to lei, yet the invoicing rule has stayed as it was. The 2026 contract set an amount in euro for every tonne not handed over, and the invoice was issued at that day euro/leu exchange rate. The 2027 text writes the amount in lei and keeps, in the same sentence, invoicing at the euro/leu rate.
Act: Order of the President of the National Authority for Regulation in the Mining and Petroleum Sector and the Geological Storage of Carbon Dioxide no. 546 of 14 September 2026 approving the Framework Contract for the transport of crude oil, natural gasoline, condensate and ethane for 2027
Published: Official Gazette of Romania (Monitorul Oficial) no. 787 of 16 September 2026, with the annex in Official Gazette of Romania no. 787 bis of 16 September 2026
In force from: 1 January 2027, the date expressly laid down in Article 3 of the order

The authority that regulates the petroleum sector has approved the contract under which almost all the crude oil reaching Romanian refineries will travel in 2027. The document runs to 42 pages and sets no prices, it sets obligations: who hands over the goods and when, who answers for losses and for quality, how long there is to pay the invoices, what happens when the pipeline stops and how much is paid for every tonne promised and not delivered. It matters to the driver filling up at the pump precisely because it is the link between import and refinery, and its costs feed into the final price of fuel, in a year in which the state has already tied the diesel subsidy to the excise cut brought on by the crude oil market crisis.

The order itself has three articles and fits on a single page. Article 1 approves the framework contract, set out in the annex. Article 2 repeals, as of the same date, Order no. 849/2025, which contained the framework contract for 2026. Article 3 sets the entry into force at 1 January 2027. The order is signed by Adriana Petcu, the president of the authority, on 14 September 2026, and was published two days later.

The carrier is named in the contract, with its registered office, tax code, bank account and share capital: Conpet S.A. of Ploiești, the concessionaire of the national transport system. The box for the shipper is left blank, because the same text is signed with every firm that needs transport. The legal basis the order invokes is Articles 5.9 and 7.2 of the petroleum concession agreement concluded between the mineral resources authority and Conpet, approved by Government Decision no. 793/2002.

One thing the contract does not do: it does not set the tariffs. Article 9(1) refers to the tariffs approved separately by the competent authority, and paragraph (9) adds that new tariffs apply from the date of publication of the order approving them, without an addendum between the parties. The framework contract therefore says how the work is done, not what it costs.

What it changes in practice

From 1 January 2027, any transport contract concluded with Conpet for crude oil, natural gasoline, condensate or ethane takes over this text. The parties fill in the figures left blank, but they cannot change the structure of the clauses, because that structure is approved by order.

The first obligation of the shipper is about quantity. The annual and monthly programme goes into Annex 3, and at the end of the year the carrier compares the contracted quantity with the quantity actually handed over. If the shipper has handed over less than 90% of the programme, it owes damages for every tonne of the shortfall up to the 90% threshold, calculated separately for imported crude oil and for domestic crude oil. The amount per tonne is negotiated, the contract leaves the space blank.

The second obligation is payment. Invoicing is done every ten days or weekly, on the quantities actually delivered at destination, and the invoice travels through the RO e-Factura system, the date of communication being the day on which the document becomes available for download. Late payment costs 0.04% a day, that is 14.6% a year. If an established payment obligation goes unpaid, the carrier gives written notice that in 5 calendar days it will stop pumping, and the consequences of the stoppage fall on the shipper alone. Pumping resumes within 24 hours of proof of payment.

There is also a penalty calculated not by the day but by the hour. Article 27 requires the shipper to take delivery of the crude oil brought to destination within an agreed number of hours, failing which it owes 0.04% of the value of the transport service for every hour of delay. The same rate applied hourly comes to 0.96% a day.

Responsibility for the goods passes from one party to the other when the handover report is signed, drawn up on the basis of the provisional ticket and the test report. Between taking over and handing over, the carrier answers for quantity and for quality, save for the standard technological losses, whose annual maximum limits are entered in Annex 4. Losses above that limit remain its own.

Transport cannot happen without operating stock, meaning the quantity of product that fills the pipeline and the tanks and never reaches destination. The shipper is obliged to make it available, and the carrier may contribute its own crude oil only if it has a surplus over the technological safety requirement of the system.

The contract also lists the situations in which the carrier may refuse the service: lack of available capacity, technical or safety reasons, non-compliant product quality, the need to cover public service obligations, outstanding payments owed by the shipper, the absence of a take-over notice and the lack of unloading capacity for rail transport.

Force majeure suspends performance for as long as it lasts, but it must be notified within 5 calendar days and supported by documents within the following 15. Either party may terminate the contract unilaterally on 30 calendar days notice, and disputes go to the ordinary courts.

What has changed compared with the previous situation

Until 31 December 2026 the framework contract approved by Order no. 849/2025 applies, published in Official Gazette of Romania no. 943 of 13 October 2025. The new text keeps the old architecture, but grows from 55 to 56 articles and adds several clauses.

The change with the widest consequences is the one in Article 3(3). Last year, the right of the shipper to cancel the transport programme for at most 45 days of maintenance stood on its own, with nothing said about its effect on the contracted quantity. It has now been added expressly that the cancellation does not affect the annual quantity in Annexes 3 and 3.1 and does not change the way the obligations under Article 11 are calculated. The ambiguity has been settled, and settled in favour of the carrier.

The currency of the damages has changed as well. In the 2026 contract, the damages for a tonne not handed over were expressed in euro, and the invoice was issued at the euro/leu rate of the day of issue. In the 2027 contract the amount is expressed in lei, but the sentence about the exchange rate has been left untouched.

Article 11 also gains a new paragraph, which says what happens when the contract ends during the year: the quantities used as the basis for the calculation are determined only for the period in which the contract was in force, and for the month in which termination occurs the programme is taken in proportion to the number of days. In the previous text, this case was not regulated at all.

The technical obligations of the shipper grow. Article 13(2) requires it to filter the crude oil before it enters the receiving tanks, so as not to affect the pumps and the metering skids of the carrier. Article 18 adds two new paragraphs on cleaning the tanks, the legibility of the calibration tables and a joint action plan where sludge deposits are found. Article 27 requires the shipper to give the carrier access to the tanks, to the ancillary installations and to utilities, including lighting and process drainage, and not to obstruct the receiving operations.

One obligation of the carrier, on the other hand, has narrowed. Article 34 required it last year to give at least 30 calendar days notice of any scheduled maintenance or repair. Now the notice is owed only where the pumping programmes are affected, within the meaning of the obligations under Article 28(1).

New clauses appear as well. Article 44 supplements the confidentiality obligation with the protection of personal data, in accordance with the European regulation. Article 56 allows the contract to be signed with a qualified electronic signature, on a single PDF file, with the same legal force as a handwritten signature. Article 8 gains three new paragraphs under which the shipper decides on its own stocks held in the custody of the carrier, as long as the decision does not affect storage capacity and current operations.

The calendar has changed too. The framework contract for 2025 was published on 25 November 2024, the one for 2026 on 13 October 2025, and the one for 2027 on 16 September 2026. The distance to 1 January has grown from 37 days to 80 and then to 107.

Finally, the place of publication has changed. In 2025, the whole contract appeared in the ordinary edition of the Official Gazette of Romania, on pages 15 to 32 of issue 943. This year the order appeared in issue 787, while the contract appeared in a bis edition, which the footnote says can be bought from the public relations centre of the Official Gazette of Romania.

Advantages and disadvantages

What it improves

  • The text is known 107 days before the year it governs, 27 days earlier than last year and 70 days earlier than two years ago. Transport requests for 2027 are decided by 30 November 2026, so firms have time to see the clauses before they draw up their programme.
  • Termination of the contract in the middle of the year no longer leaves room for argument about how far the calculation reaches. The quantities on which the damages are based are determined only for the period of operation, and the incomplete month is taken in proportion to the days.
  • The qualified electronic signature is expressly accepted, on a single PDF file signed by both parties, which removes the shuttling of two paper copies between Ploiești and the offices of the shipper.
  • The protection of personal data enters the contract as an obligation the parties take on, instead of remaining a general rule that applies from outside it.
  • The rule allowing either party to ask for the handover procedure to be repeated, where it has reasonable suspicions of an error in determining the stock, stays in the text and works both ways.

What remains a problem

  • The maintenance break and the 90% threshold do not fit together. The contract recognises the right to 45 days of scheduled shutdown, that is 12.33% of the year, but tolerates a deviation of only 10% from the contracted quantity. A maintenance window used in full eats up the whole tolerance on its own and goes beyond it.
  • The text is still half empty. In 20 of the 56 articles there are 32 blanks, and among them are the amount of damages per tonne, the deadline for paying the invoice, the deadline for delivery at destination and the period for challenging the balance. The framework contract sets the mechanisms, but the figures that hurt are negotiated separately with each shipper.
  • The three windows in which silence from the shipper counts as acceptance, in Article 9(6), Article 19(2) and Article 21, have their deadline left blank. The two windows in which silence from the carrier counts as acceptance, in Article 15(2) and Article 28(2), are fixed in the contract at 10 working days.
  • The penalty for late receipt is calculated by the hour, not by the day. The same rate of 0.04% applied hourly reaches 0.96% a day, 24 times more than the late payment penalty owed by either of the parties.
  • The maintenance notice of the carrier has become conditional. The shipper is still required to give notice of its own shutdowns 30 working days in advance, around 42 calendar days, while the carrier gives 30 calendar days notice and only where the pumping programmes are affected.
  • The contract has left the ordinary edition of the Official Gazette of Romania for a bis edition, which the footnote directs readers to buy over the counter. For the 2026 contract, anyone could read the full text in the current issue.

Practical advice

  1. If your firm hands over products for transport through the national system, work out the 90% threshold before signing the annual programme in Annex 3, not after. Any scheduled maintenance falls inside the 10 percentage points of tolerance, because cancelling the programme while it lasts no longer reduces the contracted quantity.
  2. A monthly reduction by addendum is the only lever that actually lowers the annual quantity. It must be requested at least 5 working days before the month begins and cannot exceed 5% of the initial monthly programme, so use it early, not in December.
  3. Fill the blank deadlines in Article 9(6), Article 19(2) and Article 21 with figures that can be met. These are the three situations in which the absence of a reply from the shipper means it has accepted the invoice, the additional costs or the transport balance.
  4. The payment deadline runs from the day the invoice becomes available in RO e-Factura, not from the day someone in accounting sees it. An alert on invoice downloads is worth more than an argument about penalties later on.
  5. Tanks are prepared before receipt. Article 18 allows the carrier to refuse the use of a tank it finds non-compliant, and the contract calls for cleaning, legible calibration tables, the possibility of sealing the valves and a working drain line for process water.
  6. When negotiating the damages per tonne, ask in writing for clarification of the sentence about the euro/leu rate in Article 11. The amount is expressed in lei, and invoicing at an exchange rate no longer fits it.
  7. Estimates for the following year are filed by a date in October set by the contract, and the carrier decides on the requests before 30 November. Anyone who misses the window is left with whatever capacity is still available.

Frequently asked questions

Will crude oil transport become more expensive from 2027?
The order says nothing about money. Transport tariffs are approved separately, by another order of the same authority, and Article 9(1) of the contract refers to them. The framework contract sets the rules of work, not the price. When tariffs change, the new values apply from the date of publication of the order approving them, without any need for an addendum between the parties.
Who is bound by this contract?
Conpet S.A., the concessionaire of the national transport system, and any firm that hands over crude oil, natural gasoline, condensate or ethane for transport, mainly the refineries and the traders in these products. The contract is concluded separately with each shipper, but it starts from the text approved by order, and the structure of the clauses does not change.
When does it apply from?
From 1 January 2027, under Article 3 of the order. Until then the framework contract for 2026 remains in force, approved by Order no. 849/2025, which is repealed on exactly the date the new one enters into force. Contracts concluded on the basis of the new text cover the period from the starting date agreed by the parties until 31 December 2027 inclusive.
What happens if the shipper moves less than it promised?
If at the end of the year the quantity actually handed over is less than 90% of the annual programme, it owes damages for every tonne of the shortfall up to the 90% threshold. The calculation is made separately for imported crude oil and for domestic crude oil, and the invoice is issued on the last day of the year. The amount per tonne is not set by the framework contract, it is negotiated.
Does shutting the refinery for maintenance reduce the contracted quantity?
No. The shipper may ask for the transport programme to be cancelled for at most 45 calendar days a year because of scheduled maintenance, but Article 3(3) states that the cancellation does not affect the annual contractual quantity and does not change the way the obligations under Article 11 are calculated. The only reduction that does operate on the annual quantity is the monthly cut of at most 5%, requested by addendum.
Who answers if product is lost along the way?
The carrier, from the signing of the receiving documents at the take-over point until they are signed at the delivery point, save for the standard technological losses, whose annual maximum limits are set in Annex 4. If the loss is due to the proven fault of the shipper, for instance through damage to the pipelines, the carrier is not liable.
Where can the full text be read?
The order is in Official Gazette of Romania no. 787 of 16 September 2026, and the framework contract, with its nine annexes, in Official Gazette of Romania no. 787 bis of the same day. The official edition in PDF format and the full text of the act are attached to this article.

Errors and inconsistencies in the published text

  • Article 11(1)(a) and (b): the amount is in lei, but the invoice is issued at the euro/leu exchange rate. Both points provide for damages „în cuantum de ………. lei, pentru fiecare tonă nepredată”, an amount in lei for every tonne not handed over, while the sentence immediately after says that the carrier issues the invoice „în ultima zi a anului, la cursul euro/leu din ziua emiterii facturii”, on the last day of the year, at the euro/leu rate of the day the invoice is issued. In the framework contract for 2026, approved by Order no. 849/2025, the amount was expressed in euro and the conversion made sense. After the change of currency, a reader acting in good faith can reach two different results: the amount in lei is invoiced as it stands, or it is multiplied by the rate of the day. The difference between the two is roughly five times the sum owed.
  • Article 18(3) refers to an annex that does not exist. The paragraph requires the storage tanks to be cleaned „conform Normelor privind calitatea, condițiile de pompabilitate, recepția și predarea Produselor prevăzute în Anexa 1 și 1.1 la prezentul Contract”, in accordance with the rules on quality, pumpability, receipt and delivery of the Products set out in Annexes 1 and 1.1 to the Contract. Article 55 lists exhaustively the annexes that form an integral part of the contract: 1, 2, 3, 3.1, 4, 5, 6, 7.1 and 7.2. An Annex 1.1 does not appear on that list and is not published in Official Gazette of Romania no. 787 bis either, where only Annex 1 and its sub-annexes A1, A2, A3, B, C1 to C4 and D1 to D5 appear. The obligation concerning the condition of the tanks, breach of which allows the carrier to refuse the tank, thus refers to a text that does not exist.
  • Article 11(2) fixes two different starting points for the same calculation period. The text says that, on termination of the contract, the quantities are determined „pentru intervalul cuprins între data începerii executării Contractului respectiv, data de 1 ianuarie a anului calendaristic și data efectivă a încetării Contractului”, for the interval between the date on which performance of the Contract began, that is 1 January of the calendar year, and the actual date of termination, and the wording is repeated in points (a) and (b). Article 2, however, allows a contract to begin on any date, not only on 1 January. For a contract that starts during the year, the two reference points give different periods, hence different contracted quantities and different damages.

Editorial analysis

The framework contract for 2027 is better than the one it replaces. It covers situations the old text left hanging, from termination in the middle of the year to the condition of the tanks at the interface between the two companies, and it reaches its addressees 107 days before the year it governs, against 80 last year and 37 two years ago. Anyone drawing up a transport programme for 2027 has time to read the rules before signing them, which was not the case in 2024, when the text appeared five days before the deadline by which the carrier had to decide on the requests received.

The point that does not show up when the act is read from beginning to end is that the tolerance the contract allows on quantity is smaller than the break the same contract permits. Article 3(3) recognises the right of the shipper to cancel the transport programme for at most 45 calendar days a year because of scheduled maintenance. Article 11 triggers damages below the threshold of 90% of the annual programme, that is it leaves a deviation of 10%, the equivalent of 36.5 days in a year of 365. Those 45 days amount to 12.33%, so on their own they exceed the tolerance by 8.5 days. In the previous text things could be read in favour of the shipper, because nothing said that the cancelled period stayed inside the contracted quantity. The sentence added now says expressly that it does. The result is that a refinery which uses its maintenance right in full, with no other deviation, ends up in the damages zone.

The only way out the contract leaves is the monthly reduction under Article 3(3), of at most 5% of the initial programme of the month, requested at least 5 working days in advance. Applied every month, it brings the annual quantity down to 95%, and the threshold of 90% is then calculated on the new basis, that is at 85.5% of the initial programme. A maintenance window of 45 days leaves 87.67% delivered, so the shipper escapes, but with a margin of 2.17 percentage points. The lever exists, but it takes twelve written requests filed on time, and anyone who forgets one month loses the margin.

The second observation concerns symmetry. The contract uses the mechanism of silence counting as acceptance six times: in Article 9(6), Article 15(2), Article 19(2), Article 21, Article 28(2) and Article 42. Three of them run against the shipper, and all three have the deadline left blank, to be filled in during negotiation. The two that run against the carrier are fixed in the very text approved by order, at 10 working days each. A framework contract approved by the regulator ought to do precisely that, take out of negotiation the deadlines that protect the weaker party. Here it leaves them inside, but only the ones that concern the other side. Symmetry is also the issue with the penalty of 0.04% an hour in Article 27, owed by the shipper alone, while a carrier that is late in delivering at destination owes 0.04% a day, that is 24 times less for the same unit of time.

Finally, two problems of access to the text. The legal source the order invokes for the content of the contract is Articles 5.9 and 7.2 of the petroleum concession agreement approved by Government Decision no. 793/2002. That decision has a single article and a footnote saying that the annex, meaning the agreement itself, „se comunică Ministerului Industriei și Resurselor”, is communicated to the Ministry of Industry and Resources. In other words, the duty to approve a framework contract every year springs from a text that has never been published. This year a second barrier has been added: the contract, which in 2025 appeared in full in the ordinary edition of the Official Gazette of Romania, has been moved to a bis edition, which the footnote directs readers to buy at the counter on Șoseaua Panduri. Also this year, the legal basis invoked is Article 2(5)(a) of Government Emergency Ordinance no. 81/2024, a text that gives the president of the authority the task of organising and running the institution, not that of approving framework contracts.

What should be changed

  • Align the maintenance break with the 90% threshold. Either the cancelled maintenance period is deducted from the annual programme when the damages are calculated, or the threshold drops below 87.5% for years in which the shipper gave notice of the maintenance on time. The practical effect would be that a technical shutdown the contract itself permits no longer produces damages merely because it was used.
  • Correct the currency in Article 11 and delete the reference to the euro/leu rate. As long as the amount is in lei, the sentence about the exchange rate has no object. A corrigendum of three lines would spare the parties an argument whose outcome can be five times larger than the sum negotiated.
  • Fix the deadlines in Article 9(6), Article 19(2) and Article 21 in the framework contract itself. These are the three situations in which the absence of a reply from the shipper means acceptance of an invoice, of additional costs or of the transport balance. If the deadlines that protect the carrier are written into the text, there is no reason for these to be left to negotiation.
  • Align the unit of time of the penalties in Article 27 and Article 28(2). Late receipt is penalised by the hour, late delivery by the day, although both are delays in performing the same transport. A common unit would show whether the difference in treatment is deliberate and what it is worth.
  • Publish the annex in the ordinary edition of the Official Gazette of Romania, not in a bis edition. The same contract fitted, in 2025, into 18 gazette pages of the current issue, and it is addressed to commercial operators who sign it. Publication in the ordinary edition was the rule until this year and costs nothing extra.
  • Write the real legal basis in the preamble. Article 2(5)(a) of Government Emergency Ordinance no. 81/2024 gives the president of the authority the task of organising and running the institution, not the power to approve framework contracts. If that power comes from the concession agreement approved by Government Decision no. 793/2002, the preamble should invoke it as the legal basis, and the clauses cited should be made public.

Original text of the legal act

The text below is reproduced in Romanian, the official form of publication.

The full text, as published in the Official Gazette of Romania

Official Gazette of Romania no. 787 of 16 September 2026 and Official Gazette of Romania no. 787 bis of 16 September 2026 16 pages PDF, 171 KB the act starts on page 2

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The other editions cited: nr. 787 bis/2026

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This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. For specific situations, consult a licensed attorney or tax advisor.