Eight oil refineries shut down or curb their production
At least eight Gulf Coast refineries in the path of Hurricane Katrina had shut down or reduced operations by yesterday, according to company and US Department of Energy reports. The eight represent about 2.3 million barrels of daily refining capacity.
In the Gulf, reports from the Mineral Management Services showed crude oil production down about 91 percent, or 1.37 million barrels. The Gulf also lost about 82 percent of daily natural gas production, according to the assessment released midday.
Damage appeared to be minimal, but Bob Slaughter, president of the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association, said that assessment could be premature. He said Katrina appeared to be more damaging than Hurricane Ivan, which struck a similar path last fall.
''With Ivan, almost immediately after the eye passed, the initial information was the damage was not significant," he said. ''Then we found out when people had time to assess things that there was significant damage, which was the loss of production and some capacity."
Immediately after Ivan passed last September, crude oil output fell 83 percent, or 1.4 million barrels a day, according to MMS research. Many companies operated at reduced capacity while tankers bringing oil from Venezuela were delayed.
Production over the next few months fell by 32 million barrels, or about 5.4 percent of annual output.
For now, that will serve as a benchmark for some analysts, but infrastructure damage could be greater, A.G. Edwards analyst L. Bruce Lanni said.
Katrina affected some of the Gulf's largest refineries, including
Refineries shut down included Chevron's unit in Pascagoula, Miss. (325,000 barrels per day);
None would make any projections for reopening.
''The way the current market is in crude, the last thing we want to do is spook the market with any assessments that we aren't sure of," Slaughter said.
