Trump Wades Deeper into Biofuel Debate
U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday will gather rivals from the oil and corn industries for the second time this week as the administration seeks elusive common ground on reforms to the nation's controversial biofuels law. The meetings come amid rising concern in the White House over the current state of the U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), a law requiring refiners to mix biofuels such as corn-based ethanol into their fuel…
Philadelphia-Area Refiners Push Biofuels Program Reform
Oil refinery workers, executives and local politicians gathered near Philadelphia on Monday to urge the White House revamp the nation's renewable fuels program, arguing the future of their plants are at stake. The U.S. renewable fuel program requires higher levels of ethanol and other biofuels to be blended into the nation's fuel pool, a requirement pitting the oil industry against the powerful farm lobby.
Monroe Energy Says BP Violated Its Contract
BP PLC violated its supply contract when it sold oil to refiner Monroe Energy that was a blend of lower-valued Texas crude with premium varieties, Monroe alleged in a federal court filing last week. Monroe Energy, a subsidiary of Delta Air Lines that owns a 185,000 barrel-per-day refinery outside of Philadelphia, said the blending of lower quality crudes is prohibited under the supply contract. The company asked a U.S.
PA Pipeline Spat Could Upend International Oil Flows
Refiners from the Midwest United States are fighting for access to a vital Pennsylvania pipeline – a move that could cripple their East Coast competitors and redraw the map for international flows of crude and fuel into coveted coastal markets. The regulatory dispute centers on a proposal by pipeline operator Buckeye Partners’ to that state's Public Utilities Commission. The plan would reverse the flow of fuels on a section of Buckeye’s 350-mile Laurel Pipeline…
East Coast Refiners Mull Texas Oil as North Dakota Alternative
U.S. East Coast refiners are looking to buy increasing volumes of domestic crude oil from the Gulf Coast, two sources said, the latest twist in a trade flow upheaval in the wake of the opening of the Dakota Access pipeline. Major U.S. East Coast refiners profited from railing hundreds of thousands of barrels of discounted Bakken crude to their plants daily from 2013 until 2015. But as more and more pipelines were built in North Dakota…
E. Coast Refiners Shun Bakken Rail Deliveries
Philadelphia Energy Solutions Inc, the largest refiner on the U.S. East Coast, will not be taking any rail deliveries of North Dakota's Bakken crude oil in June, a source familiar with delivery schedules said on Tuesday - a sign that the impending start of the Dakota Access Pipeline is upending trade flows. At its peak, PES would have routinely taken about 3 miles' worth of trains filled with Bakken oil each day.
Another Quarter of Weak Results Looms for U.S. Refiners
U.S. independent refiners such as PBF Energy and Phillips 66 are expected to report another quarter of disappointing profits in coming weeks, as hopes that a record summer driving season would turn the industry's fortunes around do not appear to have materialized. U.S. refiners are in the midst of their worst year since the shale boom began in 2011. High fuel inventories have punished margins this year…
Ferrellgas Exits Terminal Contract as Oil Falls
Ferrellgas Partners LP has quietly shed a five-year contract at a Philadelphia-area crude rail terminal just a year after it obtained it through a deal that gave the propane company its first foothold in the oil logistics business. The deal - the purchase of Bridger Logistics - allowed Ferrellgas to move at least 65,000 barrels of Bakken crude daily through a rail terminal in Eddystone, Pennsylvania owned by Enbridge.
Valero Energy Sues US EPA over Biofuels Plan
Valero Energy Corp filed lawsuits against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Friday to push the regulator to alter a U.S. policy designed to boost use of renewables in transportation fuels. The country's top refiner and No. 3 ethanol producer filed a challenge with the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington to review the EPA's latest Renewable Fuel Standard plans for 2014-2016. It also asked the court to reopen its standards from 2010 and 2007…
U.S. Refinery Cuts Quicken, Impact Crude Markets
For the past six years, U.S. refiners from Texas to Philadelphia have bought every barrel of crude they can lay their hands on to cash in on a golden era of healthy margins. Now, at least five refiners - including two of the country's largest - have voluntarily cut output of gasoline and distillate in the most widespread cuts since the global financial crisis, moves that may deepen crude's prolonged rout as storage tanks at Cushing, Oklahoma, the main U.S. oil hub, near capacity.
Phillips 66 Sheds Cushing Crude, Traders Spy Output Cuts
U.S. refiner Phillips 66 dumped crude for immediate delivery in Cushing, Oklahoma on Wednesday, sparking speculation that the move reflected advance warning of looming output cuts amid sluggish winter demand and record inventories. The unusual sales of excess oil added pressure to the March/April WTI futures spread <CLc1-CLc2>, with the front-month discount widening to as much as $2.37 a barrel on Wednesday, the most since November. It was unclear how many barrels one of the largest U.S.
U.S. Refiners brace for Glitches in Winter Cold
U.S. refineries along the East Coast and the Midwest are facing their first major test of the winter season since last year's blistering cold set off a string of outages, sending gasoline and diesel prices soaring. Freezing temperatures have descended upon the U.S. Northeast and Midwest ahead of a potentially historic storm that threatens to dump as much as 24 inches (61 cm) of snow in parts of the I-95 highway corridor running between Boston and Washington this weekend…
U.S. Oil Refiners Look Abroad for Crude Supplies
PBF Energy Inc, one of the largest independent oil refiners in the United States, spent heavily in recent years to build the rail terminals at its Delaware City complex that it needed to take delivery of large loads of crude coming from North Dakota's Bakken oil fields. But now it is considering eliminating those deliveries altogether, and replacing them with foreign crude imports, according to two sources familiar with the situation.
Delta's Philly Refinery at 110 pct, Margins Swell
Delta Air Lines Inc is running its Philadelphia area oil refinery at a near-record 110 percent of capacity, according to a person familiar with operations, a sign of the surprisingly strong summer profits U.S. refineries are generating. While collapsing global crude oil markets have cast a dark shadow over much of the energy industry, refiners are running flat out this summer to meet record U.S. demand for gasoline.
US Refiners' Group Wants Wide Debate on Oil Exports
The U.S. oil refining industry's association is not opposed to lifting the country's 40-year-old ban on crude exports as long as the move is part of a bigger effort to lower barriers to trade, the group's new head said on Tuesday. "We're not opposed to lifting the export ban, but we would like to think there could be a broader discussion," about all trade barriers in petroleum markets, Chet Thompson, president of the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM), told reporters.
Easing US Oil Export Ban Unlikey to Raise Gasoline Prices
A government study on Thursday essentially supported the notion that easing the decades-old restriction on exporting U.S. crude was more likely to lower than raise gasoline prices for American motorists, a conclusion that could ease concerns among lawmakers about changing the policy. U.S. gasoline prices are mainly set by global oil prices, the Energy Information Administration said in a highly anticipated analysis. "The effect that a relaxation of current limitations on U.S.
Oil Drillers Group to Fight U.S. Export Ban
More than a dozen U.S. oil producers have joined to lobby the federal government to reverse the 40-year-old ban on U.S. crude exports, a move that supporters hope would create jobs and boost national security, a spokesman for one of the companies and a lobbyist for another one said on Friday. Producers for American Crude Oil Exports, or PACE, is the first lobbying group to form on reversing the ban.
U.S. Oil Export Battle Heats Up as Drillers Group to Fight Ban
More than a dozen U.S. oil producers have joined to lobby the federal government to reverse the 40-year-old ban on U.S. crude exports, a move that supporters hope would create jobs and boost national security, a spokesman for one of the companies and a lobbyist for another one said on Friday. Producers for American Crude Oil Exports, or PACE, is the first lobbying group to form on reversing the ban.
Philadelphia Energy Firms Seek Rail Line Changes
Philadelphia-area energy officials are in talks with the local commuter rail agency to increase access to a three-mile stretch of rail near the city's airport to allow for greater shipments of Bakken crude oil, people familiar with the talks told Reuters. The outcome of the negotiations will determine whether Monroe Energy, the Delta subsidiary that runs the 165,000-barrel-a-day refinery in Trainer…
Refiners Seek Jones Act Workarounds as Crude Export Debate Heats Up
As the first U.S. oil condensate exports head to Asia from the Gulf Coast, crude producers and refiners are exploring ways to get around a century-old law that makes it three times more expensive to ship by water between U.S. ports than to sail to a foreign port. The Jones Act, originally passed to protect the U.S. maritime industry, restricts passage between U.S. ports to ships that are U.S.-built, U.S.-flagged and U.S.-crewed.
