Page 4 - LatAmOil Week 03 2023

LatAmOil COMMENTARY LatAmOil

Pascagoula refinery (Photo: Chevron)

US-Venezuela relations

appear to be shifting

Ties between the two countries have moved in a positive direction since
late December, and recent developments may signal additional progress

SINCE late December, the relationship between The second tanker, meanwhile, discharged
the US and Venezuela appears to have been 620,400 barrels of US-produced heavy naphtha
WHAT: shifting in a positive direction. in the port of Jose on January 5. Petropiar is set
Chevron is set to Two tankers chartered by Chevron arrived to use this material as a diluent to facilitate the
transport 1.5mn barrels in Venezuelan ports, one to pick up a load of processing of extra-heavy Orinoco crude oil in
of Venezuelan crude to crude oil that had been in storage for nearly four its upgrading unit.
the US in January and will years and another to deliver a load of naphtha to
sell half of the total to Petropiar, one of the US major’s joint ventures Chevron shipments
other companies.
with the national oil company (NOC) PdVSA. Chevron appears to be pleased by these events
WHY: These arrivals marked the company’s first export and indicated last week that it was willing to
These developments operations in Venezuela since the imposition of bring more Venezuelan oil to the US market –
mark a significant change US sanctions on that country’s oil industry in not just for its own use, but for resale to other
after nearly four years of early 2019. companies.
sanctions. The first tanker, the Caribbean Voyager, Indeed, the US major may already be work-
delivered its 500,000-barrel cargo of Hamaca ing to make this happen. Bloomberg quoted an
WHAT NEXT: grade crude to a ship-to-ship (STS) transfer unnamed source with knowledge of the situa-
ConocoPhillips is angling hub near Aruba. At the hub, the oil was moved tion as saying on January 14 that Phillips 66 had
for a deal but faces more to another tanker, the Sealeo, which then sailed bought some 500,000 barrels of Hamaca crude
complications. to the US Gulf Coast and arrived at Chevron’s from Chevron. The Carina Voyager tanker has
refinery in Pascagoula, Mississippi, on January already arrived in Venezuela to load the oil, the
15. news agency said.

P4 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 03 18•January•2023