BAKU, Azerbaijan, June 25. The operable atmospheric crude oil distillation capacity in the United States, which is the primary measure of refinery capacity, increased by 2 percent, or 324,000 b/d, in 2023, says the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) in its recent research, Trend reports.
This 2-percent increase marks the second consecutive year of growth in US refinery capacity, the EIA noted. However, the 18.4 mb/d capacity at the start of 2024 is still slightly below the record high of 19 mb/d recorded on January 1, 2020.
A significant portion of the increase in 2023 can be attributed to a 240,000-b/d expansion project at ExxonMobil’s Beaumont refinery in Texas, boosting the refinery’s capacity to 609,000 b/d.
Idle US refinery capacity hit an all-time low at the beginning of the year, with no facilities reported as completely idle for only the second time since 2018. Some capacity at otherwise operable refineries was reported as idle at the beginning of both 2018 and 2024.