The American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) today released a new video highlighting the safety approach and measures used by U.S. refineries with hydrofluoric acid (HF) alkylation units.
AFPM President and CEO Chet Thompson issued the following statement regarding President Biden’s suggestion that a Windfall Profit Tax should be considered to address fuel supplies and prices: “Once again, the President is more worried about political posturing before the Midterms than he is about advancing energy policies that will actually deliver for the American people."
Some policymakers are rumored to be considering a ban on crude oil and/or U.S. refined product exports. This would be a mistake. Ending U.S. crude oil or refined product exports won’t help U.S. consumers by lowering prices at pump. In fact, it could make things even worse. Let’s take a closer look at how a refined product export ban would affect gasoline and diesel supplies and, thus, prices in the United States and around the world.
Refinery utilization, measures how much crude oil refineries are processing or “running” as a percentage of their maximum capacity. It tells us roughly how much of our refining muscle is being put to work manufacturing fuel. American refineries are running full-out, at about 95% of total capacity, contributing more fuel—gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, etc.—to the global market than any other country. In fact, U.S. refineries process more crude oil every day than the United States produces, and we make more finished fuels than the United States consumes.
A Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) release—which basically involves making additional barrels of crude oil available for sale to the world market—is meant to increase global supply. Meeting today’s demand with more supply is a recipe for lower prices. The United States released millions of barrels from our SPR in the past several months, as did many other countries.
The United States has the most complex and efficient refining industry in the world, but we also have less refining capacity than we used to. Where the issue of refining capacity is concerned, it’s important to understand what refining capacity is, why we’ve lost capacity in the United States and how policies can advance the competitiveness of our refineries in the global market.
With the possibility that the EPA and policymakers could make updates to the Risk Management Plan (RMP) program, there are three things we encourage them to keep in mind: 1. RMP is working as intended and keeping people safe. 2. Any changes to RMP must be evidence-based and actionable. 3. Using RMP to zero in on hydrofluoric acid (HF) alkylation at refineries could have major impacts on U.S. fuel supplies.
Because of the extensive safety and mitigation steps refiners take wherever hydrofluoric acid (HF) alkylation is concerned, the risks from this process pale in comparison to those we assume every day when we engage in routine activities like riding a bike, driving a car and playing with pets.
AFPM opposes the Inflation Reduction Act as written. We evaluated the bill against our core principles, specifically whether the legislation would support strong U.S. refining and petrochemical industries and whether it pursued emissions reductions in a market-based and cost-effective manner. Unfortunately, the IRA falls short of these goals.
EPA’s existing Risk Management Plan (RMP) is doing what it was designed to do: drive continual safety improvements across workplaces to keep industry employees, contractors, facility neighbors and local environments safe. Any changes to a regulation as effective as the RMP need to be solidly evidence-based. Unfortunately, today’s proposal is filled with costly and misinformed changes, with little-to-no data to back them up. In fact, many of the proposed changes will adversely impact the safety and security missions of refining and petrochemical sites. AFPM looks forward to providing detailed comments on this proposal.
