Russian diesel fuel will reach the United States market within 15 to 20 days after the contracts for its supply are signed, Russia's Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said in an interview with the Russian state television channel Vesti. According to Novak, the US Department of Energy has already identified the companies that will act as counterparties and buyers under the arrangement, and negotiations on the commercial terms of the deals are currently underway. He stressed, however, that a date for signing the contracts has not yet been fixed, which means the start of the delivery window itself remains open. The remarks were reported by RatoPati and its English-language service, RatoPati English.
Novak Outlines a 15-20 Day Delivery Window
Speaking to Vesti, Novak was clear about how quickly physical supplies could move once the paperwork is complete. According to the deputy prime minister, it will take 15 to 20 days for Russian diesel to reach the US market after the contracts are signed. The clock, in other words, does not start until the agreements are formally concluded. The delivery period begins only from the moment of signing, and it is expected to run for roughly two to three weeks from that point.
The framing matters, because it separates two distinct stages of a process that might otherwise be discussed as one. The first stage is the contractual one: identifying buyers, agreeing on commercial terms and signing the documents. The second stage is the operational one: the movement of diesel to American buyers, which Novak indicated can be accomplished in a matter of weeks once the first stage is finished. The report on the interview also presented the 15-20 day figure as the period envisaged for diesel to reach the US market under the agreement with Russia, underlining that the timeline is a parameter tied to the arrangement itself rather than a loose estimate.
US Department of Energy Has Identified the Buyers
A central element of Novak's interview was his disclosure about the American side of the transaction. He said the US Department of Energy has identified the companies that will act as counterparties and buyers of the Russian diesel. This detail points to the involvement of an official US government department in organizing the purchases, even though the companies themselves have not been publicly named in the remarks reported so far.
Novak added that negotiations on commercial terms are underway. That means the parties are still working through the business details of the deals, the stage at which commercial conditions are settled. Until those negotiations conclude, the contracts cannot be signed, and until the contracts are signed, the 15-20 day delivery clock cannot begin.
The sequence described by Novak therefore runs as follows:
- The US Department of Energy has identified the companies that will act as counterparties and buyers.
- Negotiations on commercial terms are currently underway between the parties.
- Once the negotiations conclude, the contracts will be signed, although no date has been fixed for this step.
- Within 15 to 20 days of signing, the diesel will reach the US market.
The Significance of the Identified Counterparties
The identification of counterparties and buyers by the Department of Energy is the most concrete element disclosed in the interview. It shows that the organizational groundwork on the buyer side has been done, and that what remains is the conclusion of commercial negotiations. Novak's decision to state this publicly also signals that, from the Russian side, the arrangement is considered sufficiently advanced to describe its expected timeline in specific terms.
No Signing Date Yet, Leaving the Overall Timing Open
While Novak's comments shed light on the structure of the emerging arrangement, they also make clear that its timing is not settled. The deputy prime minister said explicitly that the date for signing the contracts has not yet been fixed. Because the 15-20 day delivery window runs only from the moment of signing, the actual arrival of Russian diesel in the United States cannot be scheduled with precision at this stage.
This creates a two-step timeline. The commercial negotiations must first produce signed contracts, and only then does the relatively short delivery period start. If the negotiations wrap up quickly, the first supplies could follow within weeks. If they take longer, the start of deliveries moves back accordingly. Nothing in Novak's remarks, as reported, indicated a target date for the signing.
What Happens Next
Novak's interview offers the clearest public outline so far of how the diesel supply arrangement is intended to function: a US government department has carried out the work of identifying buyers, commercial talks are in progress, and a short delivery window has been promised once contracts are in place. The remaining steps are the conclusion of the commercial negotiations, the fixing of a signing date, the signing itself, and then the 15 to 20 days of delivery that Novak described.
For now, the identity of the buyers and the commercial terms remain undisclosed, and the signing date remains unconfirmed. Until the contracts are signed, the only firm figure on the table is the one Novak gave: 15 to 20 days from signature to arrival in the US market.
