据油价网5月27日消息，美国炼油厂的开工率创下自疫情暴发前以来的最高水平，但预计短期内不会通过大规模扩产来缓解紧张的燃料市场。

一些美国最大的炼油厂正在努力扩大现有大型设施的原油加工能力，但这些增加并不能完全抵消美国炼油厂的加工能力。美国炼油厂的加工产能自疫情发生之后一直关闭。 

埃克森美孚、瓦莱罗和马拉松石油公司目前正在对三个大型炼油厂进行扩建，这将为美国每天新增35万桶的原油蒸馏能力。

产能扩大的炼油厂包括埃克森美孚在博蒙特的炼油厂、瓦莱罗的亚瑟港炼油厂和马拉松石油公司的加尔维斯顿湾炼油厂，均位于得克萨斯州。

然而，自疫情开始以来，美国每天约有100万桶的炼油厂产能被永久关闭，因为炼油厂要么关闭亏损的设施，要么将其中一些设施改造成生物燃料生产基地。

根据EIA数据，美国2021年可运营炼油厂产能略高于1800万桶/ 日，为2015年以来的最低水平。

美国炼油厂无法满足需求。并不是说需求飙升了这么多。这是全球和美国的供应能力，现在比疫情前每天减少几百万桶。

在短期内，炼油厂正在提高产能利用率，目前产能利用率为2019年底以来的最高水平。例如，马拉松石油公司预计第二季度的总吞吐量约为290万桶/日，即95%的利用率。

马拉松石油公司全球清洁产品价值链高级副总裁Brian Partee在本月初的第一季度财报电话会议上表示：“我认为，由于供应链中断、劳动力中断和疫情期间的经济中断，新增炼油产能进入市场的不确定性会更大。”

祝精燕 摘译自 油价网

原文如下：

U.S. Refiners Set To Add Just 350,000 Bpd Capacity By End-2023

U.S. refiners are operating at the highest operating rate since before the pandemic, but they are not expected to bring relief to the tight fuel market through major capacity expansions in the short term.

Some of the biggest refiners are working on expanding the crude oil processing capacity at large existing facilities, but those additions will not fully offset the U.S. refinery processing capacity, which closed during and right after COVID. 

ExxonMobil, Valero, and Marathon Petroleum are currently working on the expansion at three large refineries, which will bring a combined 350,000 barrels per day (bpd) additional crude distillation capacity in the United States.

The refineries that will see their capacity expanded are Exxon's facility in Beaumont, Valero's Port Arthur refinery, and Marathon Petroleum's Galveston Bay refinery, all in Texas.

However, some 1 million bpd of refinery capacity in America has been shut permanently since the start of the pandemic, as refiners have opted to either close losing facilities or convert some of them into biofuel production sites.

In the United States, operable refinery capacity was at just over 18 million bpd in 2021, the lowest since 2015, per EIA data.

U.S. refineries cannot catch up with demand. Not that demand has soared so much. It's the capacity for supply, globally and in the U.S, that is now a few million barrels per day lower than it was before the pandemic.

In the short term, refiners are boosting utilization capacity, which is now at its highest since the end of 2019. Marathon Petroleum, for example, expects total throughput volumes of roughly 2.9 million bpd in the second quarter, which would be a 95% utilization rate.

"I think with supply chain disruptions, labor disruptions, the disruption economically during COVID, there's a little bit more uncertainty on new addition, refining capacity coming into the marketplace," Brian Partee, Senior Vice President, Global Clean Products Value Chain, at Marathon Petroleum, said on the Q1 earnings call early this month.