Soviet Oil Production

[Yogi Yohan]

I recently read in a book about the 1942 campaign that the Soviet production of crude oil was distributed along the following lines:

Baku 80%
Grozny and Maikop 10%
Other (Siberia) 10%

Should this be reflected in the game, or is it to easy for Germany to destroy the Soviet production at Baku with strategic bombing?

[RickyB]

The oil industry on the map represents other things also, such as refineries, some lend lease (mainly for aircraft I believe and certain lubricants), storage tanks, etc, in addition to the wells. This is why some odd cities have oil ratings. However, I don't know if it is a good distribution in the game as I don't have details.

[Preuss]

Many countries had synthetic oil production as well...though to be honest...I've no idea what they used to do it.
For instance...the me-262 used a fuel which didn't depend on Rumanian production.

[Yogi Yohan]

Originally posted by Preuss
Many countries had synthetic oil production as well...though to be honest...I've no idea what they used to do it.
For instance...the me-262 used a fuel which didn't depend on Rumanian production.

Synthetic petrol was produced from carbon, a technology Germany developed well before the war since they had basicly no oil of their own. The Soviets, as far as I know, had no synthetic petrol production, since they had all the oil they could need.

In any case, I think the importance of Baku is not properly represented in the game. Its loss (together, inevitably, with Maikop and Grozny) would have been a tremendous blow to the Soviets. With 90% of the oil production gone, having refineries in other locations would have served no purpose. Lend Lease would have been the one important source of fuel left.

This makes the Fall Blau plan more rational. It has been said that even a perfect execution of Fall Blau would not have been a decisive victory, but wouldn't the Soviet armies have been crippled after loosing the Caucasian oil supply?

[RickyB]

Yogi,

I just took a look at the totals and outside of the Caucasus area the Soviets only start with Oil of 40, although it can grow slightly from there. At this level, the Soviets would be crushed pretty quickly and easily in game terms because anything under 100 results in heavy penalties in so many ways, in particular production, readiness and ops points. With the very low readiness and ops points, offensive actions would become nearly impossible, in the short term much worse than reality would have been.

Although a lower level would make sense on a production basis, every country did keep some kind of reserve in storage tanks which would keep the level higher for at least a few months, so the game impact of low oil levels is worse than I would expect in the short term. I setup a test scenario of the loss in an earlier version and at that point the Soviet readiness was on average around 40 in good weather, when not in combat and at SL5 or higher, and ops points stayed around 25-30, which incurs further penalties. I would expect this to happen, but slowly over a period of a few months as stockpiles and shipments from the area are depleted rather than nearly immediately.

[Culiacan Mexico]

Originally posted by Preuss
Many countries had synthetic oil production as well...though to be honest...I've no idea what they used to do it. For instance...the me-262 used a fuel which didn't depend on Rumanian production.

German produced virtually all (99%) of its’ aviation gas from synthetics.

[Yogi Yohan]

Originally posted by RickyB
Yogi,
... I would expect this to happen, but slowly over a period of a few months as stockpiles and shipments from the area are depleted rather than nearly immediately.

OK, perhaps the Soviets are penalized enough then. Another thing I came to think of is that should Baku had fallen to the Germans, the USA would likely have started to ship much more crude through lend-lease than they did historicaly (since the Soviets had plenty of oil).

But since this dynamic lend-lease cannot be modeled in the game, its perhaps well that the Soviets have some production outside the Caucasus.

[Ranger-75]

Originally posted by Culiacan Mexico
German produced virtually all (99%) of its’ aviation gas from synthetics.

Sorry to dissappoint you, but the Germans refined Romanian crude into high octane aviation gas, right there in the area arouns Ploesti. Their domestic synthetic production was barely able to keep their industry running, so when they lost Romania in late 1944, they were hosed. The Luftwaffe was GROUNDED except for the Jets because there was ALMOST NO aviation gas left.

[Stefdragon]

What about the V1/V2? Was it the same fuel as the ME-262?
Was it synth. I assume? When did those attacks against England end, and was it because of lack of fuel? Are there any records of those rockets being used on the Eastern Front?

(So many questions, so little time!)-DW

[RickyB]

Originally posted by Stefdragon
What about the V1/V2? Was it the same fuel as the ME-262?
Was it synth. I assume? When did those attacks against England end, and was it because of lack of fuel? Are there any records of those rockets being used on the Eastern Front?

(So many questions, so little time!)-DW

Stefdragon,

I did a quick search on the Internet and found the following:

The V1 used 80 octane gasoline, rather than high octane fuel. I am not sure how this compares with the Me262 fuel. It was the first cruise missile.

The V2 used liquid oxygen and alcohol, as it was a ballistic missile and needed its own oxygen supply for combustion.

[Culiacan Mexico]

Originally posted by Ranger-75
Sorry to dissappoint you, but the Germans refined Romanian crude into high octane aviation gas, right there in the area arouns Ploesti. Their domestic synthetic production was barely able to keep their industry running, so when they lost Romania in late 1944, they were hosed. The Luftwaffe was GROUNDED except for the Jets because there was ALMOST NO aviation gas left.

Interesting could you give me a source, because mine could be wrong.

Synthetic Production
“The Germans generally tried to produce much aviation gasoline as possible in the hydrogenation plants which used bituminous coal or bituminous coal tar (Scholven, Gelsenberg, Welheim, and Poelitz). The other plants (principally Leuna, Boehlen, Magdeburg, Zeitz, and Wesseling), which produced oil both from ovon and brown coal tar (tar derived from brown coal by low-temperature carbonization), were operated so as to obtain various products as needed.”

"The increase in synthetic oil production was far more striking than the rise in production from crude. There was no further expansion of Fischer-Tropsch facilities after 1940, but the hydrogenation plants grew in importance. These plants produced 1,500,000 tons, or 32 percent, of Germany's total oil supplies in 1940, and in 1944, when the bombing began, they were producing at a rate of some 3,800,000 tons a year and providing the Germans with 47 percent of their supplies. The hydrogenation plants, moreover, were even more important than these figures suggest - for they were the source of 99.3 percent of the Nazi's aviation gasoline.”

German Production Aviation Gasoline
(Thousands of Metric Tons per Year)

..........................1940.....1941......1942.....1943.....1944.....1945
Crude Refining.......18.........11............7...........4...........3...........0
Hydrogenation.......612.......847......1340.....1745.......996.........44

Percent from............3........1.3.........0.5......0.23........0.3...........0
Crude Oil

German produced 5,584,000 metric tons of aviation gasoline during the war of this only 43,000 metric tons was refined from Crude Oil, which is roughly 0.7 % of the total production. The loss of Romanian oil had very little direct effect on aviation gasoline production.

[Preuss]

Whatever the figures say, After the fall of Romania...or the changing of sides as it were, Germany was suffering enough fuel shortages to cripple their forces operationally. Many planes sat on fields with no fuel to fly. Though there were severe shortages, the Luftwaffe wasn't completely grounded, with ace of aces Erich Hartmann downing a Yak-9 in the early hours of May 8, 1945

[Culiacan Mexico]

Originally posted by Preuss
Whatever the figures say, After the fall of Romania...or the changing of sides as it were, Germany was suffering enough fuel shortages to cripple their forces operationally. Many planes sat on fields with no fuel to fly. Though there were severe shortages, the Luftwaffe wasn't completely grounded, with ace of aces Erich Hartmann downing a Yak-9 in the early hours of May 8, 1945

On the subject of fuel, I agree that things were getting bad in August of 1944 for the Germans; I just disagree as to why that was the case.

At the start of May 1944, German Aviation Gas reserves had reached their highest point since early 1941 at about 575,000 metric tons. In response to the Oil Campaign, Germany committed more forces to stopping the bombing of Synthetic plants, which was in part responsible for the roughly 10% increase in aviation gas consumption May/June. The production rate at the 1st of June was 57% of May’s levels, July’s was 28% and August’s was 20%. At the start of May reserves represented 3 months reserves at the normal consumption rate (Aviation gas was consumed at over 150,000 metric tons every month from early 1943 till July till production collapsed.) If steps were not taken to reduce the consumption rate, the German reserves would be dry in 4-5 months. Therefore, the German command took steps to reduce consumption starting in June: July consummation was reduced to 86% of June’s total and by the 1st of August it was reduced to 65% of June’s consumption rate. This did not solve the problem and further dramatic cuts in consumption were required, because production could only be marginally restored.

..........................Reserves.......Production........Consumption
1 May 1944........575,000.........175,000...........170,000
1 June 1944.......535,000.........100,000...........190,000
1 July 1944.........400,000.........50,000.............165,000.
1 Aug 1944.........340,000.........35,000.............125,000
1 Sept 1944........240,000.........25,000.............85,000
1 Oct 1944..........180,000.........25,000.............55,000
1 Nov 1944..........150,000.........35,000.............45,000

PS. I am not sure how much oil was being shipped to the Germans in August 1944, but it doesn't seem like it was very much and its’ capture would have had only marginal if any effect on Germany’s short term combat abilities. IMO

“The sustained attacks during 1944 together with the mining of the Danube river reduced Rumanian oil shipments to a trickle. Finally advancing Russian troops took over what was left of Ploesti in August of 1944.”

The Second World War by John Keegan