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Below is a random listing of external events, categorized monthly, which could influence the supply and pricing of petroleum products on the U.S. West Coast.  Drawing conclusions, identifying trends, and assigning significance to these events is the responsibility of the viewer. 

     2008 

• The "Clean Trucks Program" was approved by the Port of Long Beach and is expected to cost over $2 billion.  The goal of the program is clean air. Trying to include the employment status of drivers in the clean air plan would invite litigation and delay the reduction of diesel emissions.
• BP has has announced its plan to sell 153 ARCO service stations to its current dealers along with fuel supply agreements.

• Adding U.S. production would no more benefit U.S. consumers than adding production in another part of the world since oil is bought and sold in a worldwide market, and prices are set based on the balance of worldwide supply and demand.

• RINs  are the basic currency for compliance and trades in the Renewable Fuel Standard program. Marketers are weighing the implications of 2008's much larger RFS - 9 billion gallons, up from 4.7 billion in 2007 and higher than the former 2008 mandate of 5.4 billion.

• SK Corp.  doubled its average jet fuel exports to the United States in 2007 to about 50,000 b/d, and expects to raise its ultra-low-sulfur diesel shipments to the U.S.

• Earth Policy Institute has advised that "The world is facing the most severe food price inflation in history"

• Robert Chandran, chairman and chief executive of ChemOil, died in a helicopter crash on Monday in Indonesia's Riau province. As a result the opening of the Helios Terminal Corp. storage facility has been delayed.

     2007 

• US-based Kinder Morgan Energy Partners has completed its $153 million East Line expansion that increases pipeline capacity between Texas and Arizona. The expansion replaced almost 130 miles of 8-inch diameter pipeline between El Paso, Texas, and Tucson, Arizona, with a 16-inch diameter pipe, increasing capacity on the East Line to over 200,000 barrels a day.
• Congress passed the new Energy Bill, which would begin in 2008 and require usage of 9 billion gallons of biofuels and 11.1 billion gallons the following year.
• Ethanol producers are suffering due to poor ethanol distribution logistics.  This is resulting in record high inventories and disastrous producer margins. 
• Pacific Ethanol announced this morning it is suspending construction of its 50-million-gal/yr planned ethanol plant in Imperial Valley, Calif., "until the market improves."

• A Korean tanker spilled 60,000 barrels of crude in Korean water which may lead to higher tanker rates for if South Korean ship charterers decide to dump single-hull tankers.

  The European Biodiesel Board (EBB) is initiating legal action against B99 imports which receive the $1.00 U.S. tax credit and European tax breaks and subsidies.

• Canada's federal government said this week that it plans to make another push for legislation that would set nationwide ethanol and biodiesel content standards for most fuel within the next several years.

• For 2008, EPA will require refiners and importers blend 4.66% renewable fuels in gasoline under the current renewable fuels standard (RFS) rules.

• Catalyst producer Albemarle Corp., announced success in converting FCCU units at refineries into making diesel to avoid future gasoline surpluses in Europe.
• Expansion of the TraPac terminal in the Port of LA – if approved – will be the first major development project at the port for the past seven years.
• After 70 years, Western chain marketer Time Oil Co., will sell its stations and exit the petroleum industry.
• The CFTC Commitments of Traders' report (COT) shows a net long position in RBOB nearly 53.6-million barrels of unleaded regular gasoline.

• Shell faces a number of legal issues as it plans to sell the balance of its stations in SoCal..

• Green Earth Fuels begins production of biodiesel at its 45/90 million gallon per year facility at Kinder Morgan's Galena Park terminal.

• Kern Oil & Refining will be sold to NTR Acquisition Company (NTR), a special
  purpose acquisition company, will purchase the Kern refinery for $286.5-million.

• Shell to sell or joint venture 1,800 retail outlets which market about 3 billion gallons of product annually in the US.

•  Wespac announces in delay of jet fuel pipeline  to LAX Airport.

•  New West Petroleum announces its intention to sell 29 ExxonMobil station in SoCal.

•  ChemOil planning to construct 2 additional tanks to handle cleaner burning marine fuels at  its Long Beach Marine Terminal .

• The Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) is an executive order from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) calling for the reduction of transportation fuel by 20% and the increased use of low-carbon fuels.
• ASTM has passed diesel conductivity standards for oil terminal.  ULSD has naturally low conductivity, which can lead to static charge buildup when diesel is pumped at fast flow rates into tanks. In a worst case scenario, combustion is possible.
• Oregon Gov.  signed a biofuels package into law that would require 10% ethanol and 2% biodiesel blends in all gasoline and diesel fuels.
• Alon USA Energy announced that it has finalized the purchase of the crude and unfinished products pipeline system from Kinder Morgan, known as the "Black Oil System" for $4.5 million.
• Cosmo Oil Co. and Idemitsu Kosan Co. are beginning to export petroleum products such as gasoline and kerosene to the U.S., where insufficient refinery capacity is causing prices to soar.

•  CalNev receives FERC approval to increase rates in order to expand the capacity of its pipeline from Colton to Las Vegas.

• CITGO was convicted of operating two huge open-top tanks at its Corpus Christi East Plant Refinery without proper emission controls required by federal law.
• Alcohol-resistant foam is required to effectively fight fires whether from E10, E85 or "pure" ethanol (E95), fire-fighting experts say. Further, fire departments aren't yet prepared for the vastly increase amount of ethanol being transported on U.S. highways, they say.
• In response to a series of accidents in the oil refining industry, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) will make additional inspections at refineries over the next 2 years to ensure safety regulations are followed.
• The American Petroleum Institute created new standards requiring refineries to limit how close workers' portable trailers can be placed to potentially hazardous operations.
• A California asphalt refiner, Santa Maria Refining Co. will serve three years probation and pay a $1- million fine for violating the federal Safe Drinking Water Act.

• Tesoro bought the Shell Wilmington Refinery and 278 Shell stations in southern California. The stations will remain Shell branded and will be supplied by Tesoro. The combined value of the transaction was put at $1.76 billion.
  

     2006 

• The US$81 million losses in naphtha trading chalked up by Mitsui & Co.'s Singapore unit. A trader at the unit Mitsui Oil (Asia) had covered up losses in physical and futures naphtha trading by falsifying the value of the positions. Investigations are still ongoing, but the covered-up losses are unlikely to escalate, a Mitsui spokesman said earlier this week.

• BP announced late Sunday it had begun the shutdown of Prudhoe Bay, the largest producing oil field in the United States, accounting for 8 percent of domestic output, after finding severe corrosion along a transit pipeline.

• Alon may blend California gasoline, hopes for approval on Edgington.  

• Suit Claims L.A. Port Misused Funds to Build Pier 400.  A community activist says the Port of Los Angeles violated federal agreements to build an 'energy island.

• The report, by the California Energy Commission, puts down refinery outages leading to a supply squeeze, coupled with a surge in exports, as the key factors behind record high prices in the state this year.

• Several new projects for pipelines supplying Las Vegas could change that market in a few years .
• Chevron to acquire 122 USA stations in California that it will now upgrade and rebrand to either the Chevron or Texaco flag.
• The California Independent Oil Marketers Association (CIOMA) advised that state pipelines would be shut down as a result of mandatory power curtailments issued by Pacific Gas & Electric and by Southern California Edison.
• Two employees, indicted in a scheme to steal $4 million worth of fuel from the KM Seattle terminal, will face sentencing next month.

• Valero Energy will divest any interest it has in its master limited partnership that operates some 9,243 miles of pipelines, 88 terminals and 77 million bbl of storage.

• By next summer new domestic isooctane and isooctene units could account for some 50,000 b/d of gasoline additive production.
• Privately-owned U.S. agriculture company Cargill is expanding its worldwide ethanol footprint, announcing Monday it is taking a majority stake in Cevasa, a sugar and ethanol plant in Sao Paulo, Brazil.
• Plains All American Pipeline announced that is has executed an agreement to purchase Long Beach, California based Pacific Energy Partners for $2.4 billion.

   

• ExxonMobil will provide the fuel that will in turn be furnished by super jobber Tower Energy to hundreds of 7-Eleven stores  north of Florida. Tower already supplies 7-Eleven on the West Coast and is one of a number of large jobbers that ExxonMobil has offered to "back up" with unbranded product at favorable spot prices.

MAY

• Maersk Lines this morning announced a pilot program to use low-sulfur fuel in both the main and auxiliary engines of its vessels calling at California ports. The company’s announcement came during a press conference at its Pier 400 terminal in Los Angeles.
• Kinder Morgan has told carriers and drivers that pull from KM racks that they are responsible if ultra-low-sulfur diesel is tainted during loading.
• The EPA has reached an agreement with Valero that calls for the refiner to install $700 million worth of upgrades to its pollution control systems at its refineries nationwide and for Valero to pay a $5.5 million fine for federal air pollution law violations.
• Marketers were no less than enthralled with Governor Linda Lingle's recent decision to suspend the gas price cap law in Hawaii. The law caused nothing but tumult in the short, eight months it was in play, some claim.
• Retail giant Wal-Mart (E85) will experiment with offering high-ethanol-blend fuel E85 at some of the retail gasoline stations located in the parking lots of many of the company's huge discount stores.
• Approved last week with a final vote by Long Beach harbor commissioners set for today, the landmark lease renewal with SSA Terminals obligates the terminal operator, the carrier and the port to team up on clean air measures aimed at reducing air pollutants by 90 percent over the next decade.
• Recognizing that U.S. ethanol producers will hit their current renewable fuels standard (RFS) target of 7.5 billion gallons well before 2012, at least one ethanol trade association is now coming out swinging, advocating a 12 billion gallon RFS for the same timeframe.  
• The price of crude oil is likely to drop sharply beginning next year and settle at about $40/bbl by 2011 as non-petroleum investors exit the market, said Tesoro Senior VP and Chief Economist Lynn Westfall.

• With publication in the Federal Register, U.S. EPA officially lifted the 2% oxygenate requirement on Monday, enacting a provision in the 2005 energy bill aimed at granting refiner flexibility.

• To further help the U.S. transition from oil to biofuels-based economy, U.S. Rep. Marion Berry (D-Ark.) introduced a bill earlier this week requiring 10% of the transportation pool to contain biofuels by 2016, and doubling the requirement by 2021.
• If everything goes as planned this June, U.S. ethanol plants will likely have to comply with a 4ppm ethanol sulfate spec before the end of the year, according to sources familiar with ASTM.

• While most of the U.S. will employ federal ultra-low-sulfur diesel regs June 1, California will live up to its reputation as an "island" state with its own fuel regs. An advisory issued by state marketer group CIOMA tells marketers to ignore federal regs and heed only state regs.

• Alon USA to purchase Paramount Refining (54mbpd), including the old Chevron asphalt refinery in Portland, and Edgington Oil (24mbpd) which will more than double its output to 160,000 b/d of capacity.

APRIL

• Homeland Security Chief Michael Chertoff announced today that the federal government will begin conducting name-based background checks on nearly 400,000 port workers in the U.S.

• Public companies might wish they could keep their 2006 retail gasoline margins private since the steady march higher in wholesale prices has punished high volume retailers. Numbers compiled by OPIS Retail Fuel Watch for the first 100 days point to a harsh slump in margins.

• The Energy Policy Act of 2005 did not provide a "safe harbor" from MTBE defective product liability lawsuits, and as a result, gasoline suppliers are phasing out the oxygenate so fast that observers are wondering whether there will be enough ethanol to substitute.

• The National Petrochemical and Refiners Association (NPRA) issued a statement this week, highlighting its concerns with "The Oil and Gas Industry Antitrust Act of 2006," which calls for a provision that stipulates OPEC nations conducting business in the United States must abide by U.S. antitrust laws.

• Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, L.P. announced today that is has entered into a consent agreement with the U.S. Department of Transportation's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) that will result in $26 million in enhancements to the company's Integrity Management Program.

• One worker died and four were injured when a storage tank roof collapsed on Monday at the ConocoPhillips refinery in Wilmington as the men installed plates on the floor of an empty, 65-foot tank.

• An industry analyst said he expects ethanol demand to increasingly outstrip supply this year and only come back into balance sometime in the latter half of 2007.

• Talk of a mandate that would require marketers to sell E85, a blend of 15% gasoline and 85% ethanol, is raising concern among marketers, given current prices for the alcohol additive and the tight supply situation.

• Original estimates to cold iron ships at BP's Berth 121 in Long Beach were grossly under estimated for both the ships and the dock.      

MARCH

• Cleanup crews collected more than 12,000 gallons of red dyed high-sulfur diesel oil that leaked out of a pipe at an Irving Oil pier in Revere that spilled into Chelsea River.

• Kinder Morgan will invest $15 million to upgrade CalNev's pipeline capacity to about 156,000 b/d.

• Every year, OSHA compiles statistics on violations to its standards. During 2005, there were 105,817 violations to standards ranging across all industry segments under federal OSHA jurisdiction, with adjusted penalties of nearly $34 million.

• Leading U.S. MTBE manufacturer Lyondell Chemical Co. is criticizing the U.S. EPA for issuing a direct final rule earlier this year to remove the 2% oxygenate requirement, warning "there are real-world consequences of abruptly removing the oxygen content requirement during the high volatility summer driving season."

• United States refiners and blenders are not considering the use of ethyl tertiary butyl ether (ETBE) despite the growing acceptance of the octane booster use in Europe and Asia, industry sources said.

• The California State Lands Commission (SLC) has determined under MOTEMS that 5 of the 33 onshore terminals in California were found to be low-risk and in good condition.

• EPA will allow ULSD to test at 18ppm by the time it gets to retail, rather than the 17ppm allowed under the current rule. In other words, the test tolerance.

• The Port of Long Beach to lease 11.8 acres  of property for 3 years to Shippers Transport Express for about $70,780 per acre per year.

       69,600 x 12 = 835,200

       835,200 / 11.8 = 70,780

FEBRUARY

• MOTEMS – the Marine Oil Terminal Engineering and Maintenance Standards – took effect in California on Feb. 6. The new rules, developed by the State Lands Commission, require minimum engineering, inspection and maintenance standards for 33 onshore oil terminals currently in operation statewide.

• In compliance with the Energy Policy Act of 2005 signed into law last August, EPA issued two final rules that set the dates for canceling the federal 2% by weight oxygenate requirement for reformulated gasoline.    The second rule removes the 2% oxy requirement for California which should take effect in late April.

• The price of E85 — a fuel that's 85% ethanol made from grain and 15% conventional gasoline — is higher than that of gasoline, even though E85 has only 72% as much energy. The U.S. Department of Energy says a vehicle has to use 1.4 times as much E85 as gasoline to go the same distance.

• Mitsui & Co. (U.S.A.), Inc. (Mitsui USA) and Royal Vopak (Vopak) announced today their intention to merge their complementary tank terminal activities in the United States and Canada in a new Joint Venture, to be named Vopak ITC. Mitsui USA and Vopak will participate on a 50%/50% basis.

• Astra will buy the U.S. Oil & Refining refinery in Tacoma after outbidding a number of private equity groups for the 38,000 b/d facility.

• ExxonMobil has surpassed BP as the major refiner that is most aggressively seeking to sell fuel to hypermarts

• Kinder Morgan said that it plans to invest close to $10 million in new construction and upgrades in two projects to expand the Kinder Morgan CALNEV system.

• According to Fortune magazine's Nelson Schwartz, two of the world's most successful investors say oil will be in short supply in the coming months. One of them, Hermitage Capital's Bill Browder, has outlined six scenarios that could take oil up to a downright terrifying $262 a barrel.

• Marketers looking to buy into a successful C-store operation may find BP's "Connect" franchise with its "Wild Bean Cafe" a perfect fit, but they'll need a stiff upper lip when it comes to the costs involved.

JANUARY

• The Los Angeles Harbor Board has scored a "gigantic breakthrough" in controlling emissions from ships by getting P&O Nedlloyd to agree to burn low-sulfur fuel in their ships’ main engines as a condition of getting a terminal lease.

• ExxonMobil isn't bullish on refining margins. Quite the contrary. The major expects the current refining margins to fade and for domestic refining capacity to exceed demand in as little as 10 to 15 years.

• Gasoline demand grew by just 0.4% for the year, averaging 9.145 million b/d. Gasoline demand growth over the prior three years had averaged nearly 2%.

• If you need ethanol to manufacture reformulated gasoline (RFG) this spring, it will cost as many as $2.50.

• Pacific Energy Partners LP (PEP) has launched a campaign to get some backing for a proposed deepwater marine terminal that could supplement Southern California petroleum supply.

• U.S. government energy analysts have joined the chorus of those who anticipate short supply of ethanol for fuel markets through at least the first half of 2006 as refiners gear up to meet the new federal renewable fuels standard and increasingly phase out the use of MTBE.

     2005 

DECEMBER

• EPA has amended a rule to exempt California refiners, importers, and blenders from meeting the federal RFG standards.

• Shell will sell total 950 sites in 16 markets moving 1.5 billion gals/yr of gasoline and diesel. About 50% of the outlets are former Texaco sites converted to Shell. When all the sales are completed, Shell will be left with approximately 2,000 direct sites, 20% to 30% of which will be MSO units.

• Mexico imports  200,000 b/d of gasoline and is expected to buy about 60% or 120,000 b/d of its monthly requirements from the U.S., up from about 50%.

• By 2007, Shell will sell a total 950 stations moving 1.5 billion gals/yr of gasoline and diesel to jobbers. The sites will be offered through an open bid process and jobbers must commit to maintain the Shell brand at the outlets for 10 years.

• The CEC said in its "2005 Integrated Energy Policy Report." that California  should establish a minimum 10% renewable average content standard for the pool of gasoline sold in California.  The CEC also recommended a diesel fuel standard that would require minimum 5% non-petroleum content blending, likely primarily biodiesel, but would also include ethanol-blended E-diesel or gas-to-liquid components.     

• Vitol is putting its Come-by-Chance New Foundland refinery on the sales block. Vitol sought to buy the U.S. Oil plant in Tacoma, Washington as recently as last month.

• BP could spin off a chunk of its West Coast company owned AM/PM C-stores to franchisees by the New Year, OPIS has learned. The sale of 34 stores in Arizona, nine in Las Vegas, and seven in Northern California, to franchisees, could close this month, said sources familiar with the deals.

• Refiners told the CEC that they have no plans to increase or decrease ethanol due to the fact that they have existing contract volumes already in place. Nearly 87% of the ethanol used in California is bought on contracts. Also a logistical issue brought up by refiners is that they do not have the adequate capabilities to segregate multiple types of gasoline that have various concentrations of ethanol.

• The 37,000 b/d U.S. Oil & Refining complex in Tacoma, Washington is currently in the semifinal round of bidding. The refinery is not a sophisticated plant - - it makes considerable bottom-of-the-barrel products like asphalt and residual fuel. So, in order to make a substantial cut of clean gasoline, a would-be buyer would have to spend well in excess of $100-million for new hydrocracking, experts say.

• BP Products North America Inc. has said that it will spend $1 billion to modernize and maintain its  460,000 b/d Texas City refinery and that it is implementing the recommendations of the incident investigation team in the wake of the massive and deadly March 23, 2005 explosion.

NOVEMBER

• In the Pacific Northwest, ConPhil's is adding a new 25,000 b/d coker to run Canadian crude at its 97,385 b/d Ferndale, Wash., refinery.

• Pacific Energy Partners and ConocoPhillips have signed a long-term terminal services deal for Pacific Energy's Pier 400 deep-water marine terminal project in the Port of Los Angeles  for 20 years with an option for an additional 10 years in which ConocoPhillips agreed to provide a minimum throughput of 90,000 b/d of crude and other feedstocks.

• The proposed Arizona Clean Fuels refinery  has reached an understanding with the Secretariat of Energy of Mexico confirming that the company may carry out the construction, operation and maintenance, and ownership of a pipeline that will deliver Mexican crude to the proposed Yuma plant.

• Montana Refining has been slapped with a $140,000 fine by the Montana Department of Environmental Quality for releases at its 9,000 b/d Great Falls refinery. According to state documents, the company continued to load gasoline to trucks in October 2003 when its vapor recovery equipment was out of service, resulting in emissions.

• A gasoline price probe by the California Energy Commission cited four reasons why consumers in the state paid more than $3/gal for gasoline after two deadly hurricanes struck the Gulf Coast.

• Phil Verleger has some advice for ExxonMobil CEO Lee Raymond and his oil giant colleagues. Come up with a plan to return some of your profits to consumers or Congress may well do it for you.

• Less than a year after buying Crown's Pasadena, Texas refinery, Astra Oil has inked a deal with Petroleo Brasileiro (Petrobras), the state-owned oil monopoly of Brazil, for the two companies to combine forces to establish a joint venture trading and refining company in the U.S. The joint venture will operate and manage the Pasadena refinery and commercially trade and resell finished products produced at the 100,000 b/d facility.

• BP President Ross Pilari told legislators that BP would look at expanding output at its Cherry Point refinery in Bellingham, Wash., if the Congress repealed a law that limits marine development of crude facilities in the Puget Sound and limits gasoline exports from the 232,000 b/d facilities to neighboring states.

OCTOBER

• ARCO Terminal Services will spend nearly $1 million to resolve air pollution violations at the Port of Long Beach in California, where ATSC owns and operates a marine loading facility.

• The country's top five petroleum conglomerates recorded profits of over $30 billion profits, resulting in call by Congress for a gasoline reserve.

• Wal-Mart said that it will open anywhere from 335 to 370 new stores in the U.S. alone, many with gasoline dispensing equipment.

• The Arizona Department of Weights and Measures cited Southwest Petroleum Trading in connection with 592 violations of state regs governing fuel quality from its Parker AZ transmix facility.

• ATSC will pay a $225,000 fine and spend $675,000 for new pollution-control equipment under a settlement that federal officials announced Tuesday.

• Economides, a professor of engineering at the University of Houston, acknowledged that stringent environmental regulations and difficult permitting processes - things addressed in the refinery bill - are among the reasons that a new refinery hasn't been built in the United States since 1976.

• A A large Jiffy lube franchisee has acquired Berry-Hinckley Industries, Nevada's largest petroleum supplier.

SEPTEMBER

• The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has fined BP Products North America $21 million for the explosion that killed 15 on March 23, 2005 at the company's 460,000 b/d Texas City refinery.

• Motiva Enterprises LLC has agreed to pay $12 million to settle a joint federal-state civil lawsuit arising from a 2001 explosion at the company's former Delaware City refinery that killed one employee, injured several others, and caused a massive discharge of spent sulfuric acid from a ruptured tank, the Justice Department, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the state of Delaware announced today.

• Unleaded at the Gulf Coast is soaring amid heavy refiner buying this morning as refiners prepare for a category 4 or 5 storm hitting Houston and its environs. Total refining capacity in the current predicted strike zone of Houston south to Sweeny is nearly 2.4 million b/d.

• As the largest refiner in North America, Valero Energy (interview with Greehey) was at big risk when Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast. The company came through relatively unscathed and had to shut down only one of its eight refineries.

• South Korean refiners S-Oil and GS-Caltex will deliver two cargoes of 92-octane gasoline for delivery to the U.S. in mid to late October, traders said.

• Magellan Midstream Partners is paying $55-million or $37 per barrel for a products' terminal in Wilmington, Delaware.

• Hurricane Katrina will effect the production of CARB gasoline since refineries depend on alkylate and blending components from the GC.  CARB will review an RVP waiver.

• In what the oil community is calling "huge" development for getting Gulf Coast refined products moved to other U.S. markets, President Bush has temporarily waived the Jones Act, allowing foreign-flagged tankers to carry oil between U.S. ports.

• Against the back drop of $70 bbl crude, and $3.00 gal spot gasoline, Valero this morning closed on its acquisition of Premcor, creating a company with 18 refineries, representing about 3.3-million b/d of output.

AUGUST

JULY

• The Senate today gave its nod to a massive energy bill, approved by the House yesterday, calling for a flood of 7.5 billion gal/yr in renewable fuels in U.S. markets by 2012 and eliminate the oxygenate mandate in California.

• U.S. Oil & Refining is selling its assets, including a 37,000-b/d refinery in the Pacific Northwest, a pipeline, a dock and a loading rack.

• The U.S. House-Senate conference committee will mandate at least 7.5 billion gal/yr of renewables  - mostly ethanol -- in the nation's fuel supply by 2012.

• Kinder Morgan to purchase ExxonMobil's Staten Island 2.3 million barrel refined products terminal for $48 million or $20 per barrel.

• TransMontaigne paid $40 million in cash Radcliffe/Economy Marine Services, which operates two waterborne terminals in Mobile, Alabama and one in Pensacola, Fla. with a combined storage capacity of about 350,000 barrels.  ($114 per barrels)

• Valero LP has struck a deal to spin off some Kaneb facilities to Pacific Energy Partners LP.  Pacific will pay approximately $455 million for two California crude oil and refined products terminals; three East Coast refined products terminals, and a 550-mile products pipeline with four truck terminals and storage in the Rocky Mountains.

• Cargill entered a partnership that the company said will bring a spate of construction over the next couple years and some 300 million gal/yr in new ethanol output.

JUNE

MAY

• EPA says it will issue a new ULSD rule later this year to shift the retail compliance date from Sept. 1 to Oct. 15, 2006, to allow more time for terminals and retail outlets to comply with the 15 ppm ULSD standard.

• Valero L.P. will sell some West Coast terminals in order to get regulatory clearance for its $2.8-billion acquisition of Kaneb Services and Kaneb Pipeline Partners.

• The Federal Trade Commission says it has found no evidence that Shell was trying to manipulate the marketplace when it decided to shutter its Bakersfield, Calif., refinery.

• Even if high oil prices ease, prospects for cheaper gasoline, diesel and jet fuel are likely to be limited for at least several years by a growing global problem: a severe crunch in refining capacity.

• BP has issued a statement saying a "series of failures by BP personnel" during the startup of the isom unit at the Texas City refinery caused the deadly explosion and fire that killed 15 workers and injured more than 170.

APRIL

• Bush proposes building new refineries on military bases to increase supply of oil.  Huh?

• The U.S. House approved an Energy Bill which includes caps on the number of boutique fuels, allows commingling of oxygenated fuels, limits MTBE defective product liability, and allows drilling in ANWR.

• A bipartisan coalition of U.S. House members introduced the Fuels Security Act of 2005 which includes a Renewable Fuels Standard that would mandate ethanol consumption of 4 billion gallons in 2006 to 8 billion gallons in 2012.

• Valero announces plan to purchase Premcor for 8$ billion to create largest refiner in U.S. and increase capacity without actually increasing industry capacity.

• Costco experiencing inverted gasoline margins at retail outlets as majors exercise price increase constraint and financial institutions distort traditional petroleum market conditions.

• ChevronTexaco increases oil oil & gas reserves by agreeing to purchase Unocal for $18 billion.  (A lot less risk than actually drilling for oil.  Score another one for Big Oil and the FTC.)

MAR.

• The Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical & Energy Workers International Union (PACE) representing 30,000 workers in refineries, chemical plants and related businesses approved a plan Monday to extend the workers' contract until Feb. 1, 2009.

• Marketers that fail to install Phase I vapor recovery equipment at California stations by April 1 are given a temporary reprieve for effort to comply.

• Sam's Club has been quietly transitioning from jobber delivered fuel to handling fuel procurement on a FOB refinery basis.

• In three years Costco has more than tripled its Phoenix volumes, by adding just three sites. It has just seven sites in the county, with an average monthly sales volume of 715,000 gal per station.

• Pacific Pipeline Line 63 washed out in Grapevine, north of Los Angeles, and spilled 3,000 barrels of crude into Pyramid Lake which supplies water to L.A..

• The U.S. EPA gave its stamp of approval for  the air quality permit an Arizona Refinery, the first ground-up oil refinery to be built in the U.S. in nearly 30 years.

• Kinder Morgan warns refiners and shippers to not make any business decisions based on their East Line expansion plans.

• A federal agency assembled a task force to examine how pipeline company Kinder Morgan Inc. (KMI) inspects its lines.

• BP receives endorsement for its gasoline from Ford. BP has steadfastly refused to apply for GM's "Top Tier" recognition, telling marketers last year that "over-dosing detergent additives to solve vehicle hardware design issues" is "neither a correct nor an efficient approach" to serving customer needs.

• The South Coast Air Quality Management District on Wednesday won a record $81-million settlement with energy giant BP, which regulators accused of illegally spewing toxic gases from its Carson refinery for nearly a decade.

• Motiva has agreed to pay a $10 million fine to the negligent death of a worker in a tank explosion at its Delaware City, Del., refinery.

• Walmart announces development of 200+ Wal-mart stations to start up in 2005. Benchmark Resources, a wholly owned subsidiary will purchase the fuel from numerous refiners and wholesales.

• Flying J will take over operations at the Shell Bakersfield refinery in mid March.

FEB.

• Longhorn Pipeline announces delivery of product to El Paso market which may ultimately reduce demand from California refineries.

• Kinder Morgan announces expansion plan for East Line System to be completed in first quarter 2006  which will increase capacity from Tucson to Phoenix by 80% to 45,000 BPD.  Capacity from El Paso to Tucson will increase 60% or about 54,000 BPD.

• Kinder Morgan receives permits to construct 10 tanks (800 MB) at its Carson terminal for $40 million.

• Paramount Petroleum announced tha