Product Export Markets Getting Competitive

摘要

Competition in the global refining market is likely to heat up in coming years as new export refineries in Asia and the Middle East begin to compete head-to-head with US refineries supercharged by the shale revolution. It is commonly believed that rising light, tight oil (LTO) production in the US will simply back out progressively lower-quality imported crude given a near ban on politically sensitive crude exports from the US, leading more complex refiners to shut down their cokers and other unnecessary units as time passes. This would in fact lead to declining effective crude capacity in the US, since crude distillation units for more complex refineries can only process 50%-80% as much light, sweet crude as their current heavier and sourer slates.