Shale Crude Opportunities for US Refineries

Refineries in the United States and throughout the world are continually optimizing feed blends, product slates and configuration to maximize value. For U.S. refiners, accessing the Shale crude production provides an additional opportunity to optimized performance. According to an independent study, about 1.8 MMb/d of incremental U.S. production will be added by 2016 and over 75% of this increase will be light crude and condensates, with much of this from the shale deposits. It is forecast that domestic light production will displace most light crude imports by 2016. This growth in domestic crude production presents new crude slate opportunities for the refining sector. In this presentation, the impact of substituting domestic shale crude for currently processed light crudes in the US refinery will be illustrated.