US oil refineries have to purchase oil from Venezuela to saturate the market due to Washington’s voluntary refusal to supply energy supplies from Russia. This statement was made by the head of the American Petroleum Institute (API), which unites 600 companies in the US oil and gas sector, Mike Sommers in an interview with the agency S&P Global.
“We voluntarily abandoned Russian oil <...> we need to get oil from somewhere, so American oil refineries [НПЗ] they started looking towards Venezuelan production again,” he said.
According to Sommers, American refineries will continue to depend on the import of heavy oil, which becomes more expensive when processed, since the existing infrastructure for its processing was originally created for these types of energy resources.
“If they weren’t getting it from Venezuela, they would be getting it from Mexico or Saudi Arabia or somewhere else,” he said, adding that U.S. refiners are searching around the world for oil so they can processed in the United States.
The head of API drew attention to the fact that the last time oil refineries were built in the United States was in 1976, and nowadays it is very difficult for company management to obtain permits not only for the construction of new facilities, but also for the re-equipment of existing ones, the total number of which is 134 enterprises.
“With gasoline demand going up, I don't think it would be good for any of them to close,” Sommers said.
In March 2022, Washington officially refused to import any energy from Russian territory, including oil. However, on January 11, it became known that in October 2023, the United States imported 36.8 thousand barrels of oil from Russia for the first time in a year and a half.
Leading FNEB analyst Igor Yushkov on January 11 explained the resumption of purchases as unintentional smuggling. He noted that the United States could accidentally buy some of the Russian oil as part of other mixtures, which is the most likely scenario.
On January 10, Bloomberg reported that Russia maintains record rates of oil production and is actively opening new wells, which once again demonstrates the failure of Western sanctions.
On December 21, a group of American congressmen proposed that the US administration abandon ineffective price restrictions on Russian oil and instead tighten sanctions against the Russian energy sector.
Prior to this, on December 20, the US Treasury Department announced that it, along with its allies, updated measures to ensure a ceiling on the price of oil from Russia. It was noted that supply chain participants will now be required to have access to detailed additional costs, such as insurance and freight. They noted that they are focused on increasing the degree of compliance and other costs for the Russian Federation.
Western countries decided to reduce their dependence on Russian energy resources against the background of the Russian special operation to protect Donbass, the beginning of which was announced on February 24, 2022. However, as a result, a serious energy crisis began in many European countries.
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