EIA completes study on rising crude oil adjustment, with two upcoming changes to reduce it (3/22/2023)

Over the past few years, the difference between our estimates of supply and disposition has increased in our U.S. crude oil balances. We have studied the growing difference and identified ways in which we have been overstating disposition and understating supply. Importantly, we believe these issues are unrelated to our monthly inventory statistics...

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U.S. crude oil exports increased to a new record of 3.6 million barrels per day in 2022 (3/15/2023)

U.S. crude oil exports averaged a record 3.6 million barrels per day (b/d) in 2022, a 22% increase (640,000 b/d) from 2021 (Figure 1). The number of destinations for U.S. crude oil exports in 2022 decreased from 39 to 38. South Korea received the largest share (10.3%, or 371,000 b/d) for the first time, followed by the Netherlands (10.2%, or 368,000...

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U.S. exports of petroleum products set a new record in 2022 (3/8/2023)

In 2022, the United States exported 5.97 million barrels per day (b/d) of petroleum products, an increase of 7% (or 405,000 b/d) compared with 2021, setting a new record for total petroleum product exports. In volumetric terms, the largest increase was in exports of distillate fuel oil—usually consumed as diesel—which increased by 18% (193,000 b/d)...

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Diesel prices in Europe may be volatile as markets adjust to import ban (3/1/2023)

Following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the EU began passing a series of sanctions against Russia. On June 3, 2022, the EU adopted a sixth package of sanctions, which banned imports of Russia's seaborne crude oil into the EU (effective December 5, 2022) and banned seaborne imports of Russia's petroleum products, including...

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Open interest in futures and options markets increase as traders try to anticipate improvement in the economy (2/23/2023)

After declining to historical lows in 2022, open interest (the total number of futures and options contracts that have not been settled) increased for both crude oil and petroleum products at the start of 2023. Commercial traders, who use financial markets primarily to hedge their business activities, led the increase in open interest for NYMEX West...

Feb 2023

U.S. renewable diesel production surpassed biodiesel production in November 2022 and we forecast that it will grow (2/15/2023)

In our January 2023 Petroleum Supply Monthly (PSM), which includes U.S. biofuel production data through November 2022, renewable diesel production surpassed biodiesel production for the first time since we began reporting renewable diesel production data in our Monthly Energy Review (MER) in 2011 (Figure 1). Renewable diesel production in November 2022...

Feb 2023

Colorado refinery outage is leading to higher gasoline prices in Rocky Mountain region (2/8/2023)

On December 24, Calgary-based refiner Suncor shut down its 103,000 barrel-per-day (b/d) oil refinery in Commerce City, Colorado. Suncor announced that extreme cold weather earlier in the month had damaged equipment and that the repairs would require a full shutdown of the facility and delay operations until the end of the first quarter of 2023. The...

Feb 2023

Domestic policy and geopolitical developments affected China’s refinery activity and trade in 2022 (2/1/2023)

In 2022, less crude oil was processed by refiners in China than in 2021, marking the first year-over-year decrease in data going back to 2000. Less refinery activity in China resulted from mobility restrictions related to COVID-19 and low petroleum product export quotas. As a result, in 2022, China imported less crude oil in total, but more from Russia...

Feb 2023

Residential heating oil prices fall while propane prices remain flat (1/25/2023)

At the start of the winter heating season, the retail price of home heating oil in the United States climbed rapidly, establishing a new record toward the beginning of November. The price of propane was slightly above the previous five-year (2017–2021) average at the beginning of the heating season. Since then, the price of home heating oil has fallen...

Jan 2023

Refinery utilization drops due to cold weather but will remain high in 2023 and 2024 (1/19/2023)

In our January 2023 Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO) we forecast prices and volumes of petroleum refining through 2024. Our forecast takes into account a cold weather system that caused outages and mechanical complications in the U.S. refining sector in late December 2022 and early January 2023. The storm contributed to a sharp but temporary reduction...

Jan 2023