In 2021, Istmo crude exports barely represented 14% of the company’s total shipments, last year this percentage rose to 30%.
The state company resumed exports of Istmo crude at the end of 2019, after having suspended them for more than a year during the last government when it was decided to reserve this oil for the company’s refineries. Using it implied obtaining more high-value products such as gasoline and fewer products, such as fuel oil, which are usually sold at a lower price in the market.
But the latest data from the company confirm that the trend is beginning to be different: Pemex is reserving Maya oil – or heavy oil – for domestic use and sending Istmo crude oil abroad to a greater extent.
“They cannot take light crude because it is very expensive, it is more expensive than the crude that they are buying to feed the refineries at the moment,” says a company source. Pemex is also opting to use a mixture of fuel oil and condensates – a hydrocarbon whose production is growing rapidly – to feed its refining system and then this lowers its demand for oil.
Exports of Istmo crude were paid at an average of 92 dollars per barrel, compared to 88 dollars per barrel for Maya crude, which is much higher in sulfur concentration and less attractive in the industry.
And, although the administration has talked about reducing shipments abroad to prioritize the local market, the figures speak of a smaller decrease in transactions. Pemex averaged exports for the year of 953,000 barrels per day, a drop of 7% compared to a year earlier.
Pemex has not yet revealed the pace at which its refineries worked during the last month of last year, but the figures published on Friday indicate a significant increase in gasoline production. The state company averaged a production of 670,000 barrels of gasoline per day for the year, an increase of 14% or around 95,000 barrels compared to a year earlier.
Using a heavy blend in refineries has already had some effects on the company, which in December once again produced more fuel oil than gasoline, a trend it abandoned for a couple of months during the year.
Despite the increase in gasoline production, the oil company’s administration has already confirmed that it will not meet its goal of ending fuel imports before the end of the six-year term.