The state-owned Pemex has not been able to meet its crude production targets, but it made progress in its goal of increasing gasoline production and, last year, raised this figure to levels not seen since 2017.
The oil company reported a production of 232,000 barrels per day of gasoline, an increase of 25% compared to a year earlier, when it produced 186,000 barrels per day, according to statistics published this afternoon by the state company. The company has placed fuel production at the center of its strategy, despite being considered a not-so-profitable activity and pointed out by analysts as a strategy that may not be sustainable in the long term.
Pemex managed to increase gasoline production at its six refineries without making a big cut in its exports. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has assured that the latter will be gradually reduced to give priority to national demand and refinery consumption. The plan states that the state company will stop exporting oil in 2023.
During last year, Pemex averaged exports of 1,018 million barrels per day, a decrease of 9% -equivalent to 102,000 barrels- compared to a year earlier.
The oil company’s plan is to increase its gasoline production to around 310,000 barrels this year. These forecasts do not include the incorporation of Dos Pemex and Deer Park, the complex that the state company bought from the giant Shell.
The other side of the increase in production
The current commitment to gasoline has an unfavorable effect for the company: an increase in the production of fuel oil, a by-product of refining, which, although it has been used less and less in recent months due to its high contaminant levels.
The state company has ended the year with fuel oil production above that of gasoline. In 2021, Pemex produced an average of 233,000 barrels per day of gasoline and 244,000 barrels per day of fuel oil.
This last figure implies an increase in production of 39% compared to a year earlier. The exponential increase in fuel oil production is due to the diet of the refineries, which has been based to a greater extent on heavy crude or Maya, for which three of them are not configured and whose use results in lower value products, like fuel oil.
In its plan for this, the state company plans to reduce its production of fuel oil, so that it is 10% below the generation of gasoline.
