Valero looks to purchase BP's Texas City refinery.

摘要

The British oil major's 475K-b/d Texas City, TX (US) facility has been on the market for sale for 16 months, with few potential buyers having expressed interest. Recently, Motiva (a j.v. between Royal Dutch Shell and Saudi Aramco), which just completed a $10B expansion at its Port Arthur, TX (US) refinery to raise capacity to 600K b/d, was linked to the complex. But BP has acknowledged that the Motiva rumor was started by its own employees, and outsiders feel that Valero—which already operates a 225K b/d refinery in Texas City—may have the most interest in purchasing BP's complex due to the proximity of the two plants and the fact that BP Texas City operates a 54K b/d conventional hydrocracker and 63K b/d resid hydrocracker. Valero has already invested in new hydrocracking capacity at its Garyville, LA (US) refinery in an effort to increase diesel production to export to Latin America. Its recent purchase of Chevron's 210K-b/d Pembroke, UK plant may also allow it to send some diesel produced at its Gulf Coast facilities to Europe.