Several key refineries began restarting over the weekend after Hurricane Harvey slammed into the US Gulf Coast energy hub and crippled their operations, but gasoline prices remained near two-year highs amid fears of shortages.
The storm took down a quarter of US oil refining capacity and lifted average gasoline prices by more than US$0.175 since Aug. 23.
Pump prices were at US$2.59 a gallon on Saturday, according to motorists advocacy group AAA, up 3 percent from Friday and 16.7 percent higher on average than a year ago.
On Saturday, Exxon Mobil Corp began restarting the nation’s second-largest oil refinery, the 560,500 barrels per day (bpd) Baytown, Texas, unit, while Phillips 66 said it was working to resume operations at its 247,000bpd Sweeny refinery and at its Beaumont oil and fuels terminal.
The restarts followed an announcement from Valero Energy Corp on Friday that it was increasing production at its Corpus Christi, Texas-area refineries.
The hurricane battered Texas before weakening to a tropical storm and inundating the region with torrential rains and flooding.
Some pipelines also restarted over the weekend, assuaging worries over the ability of refineries to get the crude oil they need to operate.
Magellan Midstream Partners said it had resumed operations on Friday on its BridgeTex and Longhorn crude oil pipelines, which transport about 675,000bpd of western Texas crude to East Houston.
The company said its refined products pipeline system originating at East Houston has resumed service and is to deliver gasoline and diesel to the Dallas and West Texas area.
Phillips 66 also said its Pasadena refined products terminal would resume truck loading for gasoline and diesel this weekend.
Still, the majority of Texas ports remained closed to large vessels, limiting discharge of imported crude, and the Colonial Pipeline, which hauls more than 3 million barrels per day of refined products including gasoline, diesel and jet fuel from the Gulf Coast to the populous US northeast was also partially closed.
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