SINGAPORE, Oct 13 (Reuters) – The new U.S. sanctions on a major Chinese crude oil terminal have led the refining company Sinopec to reroute a supertanker and ask some of its plants to lower crude processing rates, according to ship tracking data and Chinese consulting firms.

A supertanker that was carrying oil to the Chinese port of Rizhao in Shandong province changed its destination over the weekend after the U.S. imposed sanctions on the port's import terminal on Friday, data from LSEG revealed.

Following the U.S. announcement, Sinopec informed about six subsidiary refineries that receive crude oil from the sanctioned terminal to reduce their operating rates to 80% for the rest of October, as stated in a market update by the consulting firm Sublime China Information.

Another consultancy, JLC, estimated that Sinopec’s crude oil processing in October might drop by 3.36% from earlier plans to around 5.16 million barrels per day.

Sinopec has not yet responded to requests for comment.

LSEG data indicated that the supertanker New Vista, chartered by Sinopec's trading arm Unipec and originally set to discharge at Rizhao on Sunday, has changed its destination to the ports of Ningbo and Zhoushan, expected to arrive on October 15.

The New Vista can carry 2 million barrels of crude and is currently loaded with Abu Dhabi’s Upper Zakum crude grade.

The Rizhao Shihua Crude Oil Terminal, which is partly owned by a Sinopec logistics unit, was included in the U.S. Treasury's sanctions list, which also covers ships transporting Iranian crude oil and liquefied petroleum gas.

The terminal, located in Lanshan city within Shandong province, a key area for Chinese oil refining, was sanctioned for receiving Iranian oil via sanctioned vessels, according to U.S. authorities.

Industry executives and analysts report that one-fifth of Sinopec's crude oil imports pass through the Rizhao terminal.

(Reporting by Florence Tan and Trixie Yap; Additional reporting by Chen Aizhu; Editing by Christian Schmollinger and Jan Harvey)