Flow of crude oil through Forties Pipeline System restricted

LONDON, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Crude oil along the Forties Pipeline System in the North Sea has been running at a reduced rate since an outage along the system late last week, but is due to return to normal levels later on Monday or early Tuesday, operator BP said on Monday.

Industry monitor Genscape said Forties crude oil was flowing through the pipeline at a daily rate of around 400,000 barrels per day, down from its estimated average of 488,000 bpd.

A spokeswoman for BP, which operates the pipeline that carries Forties crude to the Hound Point terminal on the Scottish coast, confirmed this was the case.

"It is currently restricted," the spokeswoman said. "Based on the most recent data, (flows will return to normal) later today or tomorrow morning."

Forties is the largest of the four major North Sea crudes, that underpin the dated Brent benchmark, off which most of the world's crude oil trades are priced.

Prices for Brent itself, Forties, Oseberg and Ekofisk (BFOE) are used to create the daily dated benchmark. (Reporting by Amanda Cooper; Editing by David Evans)