Gasoline: European refiners' destiny

摘要

For years, European refiners have struggled because their plants-geared to produce a high proportion of gasoline-were not well matched to regional consumption that increasingly leaned toward diesel. Now, the pendulum of demand has swung so far back the other way that refiners are working to eke out the last drop of gasoline out of their plants, while keeping diesel output to a minimum. 'We expect European refiners to do all sorts of things,' said Energy Aspects head of oil products research Robert Campbell. 'We will see fractions pulled out of the diesel pool and moved into jet and we will see naphtha fractions taken out of jet and moved into light ends.' According to Jonathan Leitch of Wood Mac, 2015 was 'an exceptional year' for the European refiners with the cat cracking margin in the Northwest region posted the best performance since 1995 or in history as boasted by some refiners.