|
||||
Home > News > Industry Facts/FAQ > It's Your Business Fact Sheets > Fuels Fact Sheet |
|
|
|
Fuels FactsThe U.S. petroleum refining and distribution industry is a large and complex system:
Gasoline is the largest volume petroleum product, accounting for nearly half of U.S. petroleum product production. Highway (or on road) diesel represents 15 percent of the average production at a domestic refinery. Click here to view chart describing typical refinery output. The refining industry responds to changes in demand and economics by adjusting processes and blending procedures to vary the yield of finished products. There are many different petroleum products. Fuels, nonfuel products and petrochemical feedstocks are petroleum product categories.
Frequently asked questions What is gasoline? A mixture of hydrocarbons for use as an automotive (spark-ignition internal combustion engine) fuel. Key properties include aromatics content, benzene content, distillation percentages/temperatures, octane, olefins content, oxygen content, Reid vapor pressure, and sulfur content. Reformulated, oxygenated and low RVP (Reid vapor pressure) conventional are types of gasoline. Gasoline specifications include ASTM D 4814 (Standard Specification for Automotive Spark-Ignition Engine Fuel) and EPA regulations in 40 CFR Part 80. In addition, many states have their own gasoline standards (click here for NPRA’s summary of state and local gasoline and diesel fuel requirements). What is octane? The octane rating measures the anti-knock (uneven combustion) properties of motor gasoline. What is diesel fuel? A mixture of hydrocarbons for use as a heavy-duty truck (compression ignition engine) fuel. Key properties include aromatics content, cetane number/index, distillation temperatures, and sulfur content. Highway, off-road or nonroad (i.e., farm and construction), railroad and marine are types of diesel fuel. Diesel fuel specifications include ASTM D 975 (Standard Specification for Diesel Fuel Oils) and EPA regulations in 40 CFR Part 80 and 40 CFR Section 69.51. In addition, a few states have their own diesel fuel standards (click here for NPRA’s summary of state and local gasoline and diesel fuel requirements). What is heating oil? A mixture of hydrocarbons for use as a burner or furnace fuel and meets the specifications in ASTM D 396 (Standard Specification for Fuel Oils). What is distillate fuel oil? A general classification that includes diesel fuel and heating oil. What is jet fuel? A mixture of hydrocarbons for use as a commercial and military aircraft fuel. What is petroleum coke? A relatively pure carbon residue. What is a barrel? 42 U.S. gallons What is a refinery? A manufacturing facility that produces petroleum products from crude oil or other hydrocarbons. Refinery sizes in the U.S. range from less than 10,000 barrels/day to over 500,000 barrels/day with an average size of 117,000 barrels/day. Average U.S. refinery capacity utilization in 2004 was 93.0 percent, in 2005 was 90.6 percent (lower in 2005 at least in part due to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita), in 2006 was 89.7 percent, and in 2007 was 88.5%. Click here to view the U.S. Refining Capacity report. What are some of the processes in a refinery? Crude oil is not a homogenous substance. It varies widely in color, gravity, viscosity, sulfur content, mineral content and other characteristics. There are hundreds of crude oils available. Crude oil types include sweet (low sulfur), sour (high sulfur), heavy (high specific gravity), light (low specific gravity), paraffinic, naphthenic, and intermediate (somewhere in between paraffinic- and naphthenic-type). No two refineries are identical. The choice of processes is based on crude oil type, product demand, product quality requirements, etc. Boiling Distillation - - uses heat to separate hydrocarbon components in crude oil; boils the crude oil and then cools and condenses the vapors. Distillation is the first processing step in a refinery. It separates the crude oil into unfinished gasoline, jet fuel, and diesel fuel fractions and a residual fraction that can be converted to the more valuable products with further processing. Breaking Cracking processes - - use heat, pressure and/or catalysts to convert "heavier" oil molecules to "lighter," more valuable products (such as gasoline). Examples: thermal cracking, catalytic cracking, and hydrocracking. Bending Using specific chemical reactions to rearrange and combine molecules to improve product quality (e.g., increase octane or combining small gaseous molecules into larger, liquid products) and remove contaminants (i.e., sulfur, nitrogen and metals). Examples: alkylation, catalytic reforming, hydrotreating, isomerization, and polymerization. Blending Putting the finished product together economically while meeting all fuel performance and regulatory specifications. For example, gasoline is a blend of components, such as butanes, reformate, alkylate, coker gasoline, hydrocrackate, isomerate, catalytic gasoline, naphtha, oxygenates and additives. Where are U.S. refineries located? Click here to view a U.S. map with refinery locations. What is U.S. demand for finished petroleum products? In 2007,
* Includes residual fuel oil, naphtha and other oils for petrochemical feedstocks, lubricants, waxes, petroleum coke, asphalt and road oil, still gas and other miscellaneous products. In 2007, domestic petroleum product demand was met by:
Although 95% of total refined petroleum product demand is produced domestically, approximately 65% of the crude oil refined in the U.S. is imported from other nations. How are finished petroleum products distributed around the country? Local refinery production, net imports and net receipts (from one domestic region to another) are possible sources of petroleum product fuel supply. The East Coast is dependent on supply from distant sources, Gulf Coast refineries and imports; East Coast refineries contribute only about 30 percent of local demand. The Midwest is dependent on supply from the East and Gulf Coasts. The Rocky Mountain area and the West Coast are self-sufficient. The refineries in the Gulf Coast meet local needs, contribute about half of the East Coast petroleum product demand, and are significant suppliers to Midwest consumers. These region-to-region movements are significant because petroleum products are transported by pipelines and barges at slow rates (only a few miles an hour) and over long distances. Examples of long distance pipelines moving petroleum products from the Gulf Coast to the East Coast are Colonial Pipeline (1,500 miles) and Plantation Pipe Line (1,100 miles). Explorer Pipeline (1,400 miles) and TEPPCO, LP (1,100 miles) are long distance examples from the Gulf Coast to the Midwest. It can take 1.5 to 2 weeks for petroleum products to travel the entire length of these interstate pipeline systems. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||