Page 10 - NorthAmOil Week 10 2021

NorthAmOil PIPELINES & TRANSPORT NorthAmOil

Valero to switch all fuel exports to

Mexico away from cross-border rail

US-MEXICO US-BASED Valero is looking to gain more con- The company already has access to these
trol over its fuel transportation and distribution ports under long-term contracts, he pointed out,
routes in Mexico, a company representative said and can use them to send fuel to the Gulf coast
last week. for transfer to domestic railway lines leading to
According to Carlos Garcia, the head of Vale- the smaller terminals that Valero is now build-
ro’s Mexican operations, the firm is looking to ing in Mexico. “We will only use rail to move the
designate two seaports on the Gulf Coast as the product inland, which is safer than trucks,” he
only points of entry for its petroleum product was quoted as saying by Platts.
deliveries to the country. As such, he told S&P Valero is currently building up its network
Global Platts, it will phase out the practice of of fuel terminals inside Mexico and hopes to
delivering fuel via railway lines that cross from wrap up its efforts on this front in 2022, Gar- The firm is
Texas into northern Mexico. cia added. This programme will entail the
Taking this step will give the firm more con- construction of several new storage and dis- looking to
trol over its own production, he commented. tribution facilities – including a 140,000-bar-
“Our goal is to supply the Mexican market with rel depot in Aguascalientes, a 425,000-barrel designate two
fuels that have been produced at our refineries depot in Monterrey and a 505,000-barrel depot
through a network that we control, so that we in Guadalajara, he said. seaports on the
can ensure the quality of the product and relia- Overall, he added, these efforts will also bring Gulf Coast as
bility of the supply,” he said. the firm’s Mexican storage capacity up to 6mn
Valero has been sending refined petroleum barrels. They will also allow Valero to “have our the only points
products to Mexico via rail since 2018, he noted. products in the high-demand markets delivered
This route allowed for fuels from the compa- in an efficient and secure way,” he said. of entry for
ny’s refinery in McKee, Texas, to be transported The company has already begun work on
from Houston to terminals in the Mexican bor- several domestic storage depots, including its petroleum
der states of Chihuahua and Nuevo Leon, he facilities with a capacity of 640,000 barrels product deliveries
explained. each now under construction in the cities of
Now, though, Valero wants all of these vol- Puebla and Mexico City. These facilities were to the country.
umes to be delivered to its terminals in the ports built for Valero by IEnova, the Mexican sub-
of Altamira, which is in the southern part of sidiary of California-based Sempra Energy.
Tamaulipas State, and Veracruz, which lies fur- IEnova also built the company’s 2.1mn-barrel
ther south in the central part of Veracruz State. fuel terminal in Veracruz and is due to begin
This shift will allow it to offer better service to constructing a 1.1mn-barrel depot at Altamira
customers in central Mexico, Garcia said. in May of this year.™

P10 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 10 12•March•2021