Latin America’s ageing refneries are running at just a third of capacity, as mostly state-owned operators scramble to deal with a collapse in oil demand and associ- ated storage constraints, local downstream ofcials surveyed by Argus say. Many of the region’s refneries, with combined capacity of 7.5mn b/d, were already underutilised because of a combination of weak economics and techno- logical lags long before the Covid-19 crisis. A number are now focusing on diesel production to meet the needs of the distribution and agricultural sectors. And LPG demand appears to be holding up. But commercial considerations are not always shaping operational decisions, given the refning sector’s role as a major employer.
展开▼
