By Erwin Seba
HOUSTON, Feb 18 (Reuters) - U.S. gasoline prices on Tuesday
continued a week-long climb as unplanned weekend refinery
outages compounded earlier shutdowns at major U.S. Gulf Coast
and East Coast plants, gasoline traders said.
Over the weekend, four refineries in Texas and Louisiana
shut units directly making gasoline or portions of it, according
to refinery sources and energy industry intelligence service
Genscape.
Those new outages are expected to tighten U.S. gasoline
supply as refineries prepare for planned shutdowns that
typically begin in spring and prepare the plants for summer
driving-season production.
The average retail price for a gallon of unleaded gasoline
was $2.45, up from $2.33 a year ago, according to petroleum
analytics firm Gas Buddy. Prices have been falling this year as
inventories rose and crude oil prices slumped.
On Tuesday, unleaded gasoline futures rose 1.47%, or
2.30 cents, to $1.6066 a gallon on the New York Mercantile
Exchange. The futures are up nearly 7% since Feb. 12, when a
major fire shut most of Exxon Mobil Corp's Baton Rouge,
Louisiana, refinery, the fifth-largest in the United States.
Exxon aims to restore production at three shut crude
distillation units (CDUs) as quickly as possible and raise
production on a fourth, which is operating at a minimal level,
said sources familiar with operations. CDUs convert crude oil
into feedstock for all other production units.
An Exxon spokesman said operations continue but declined to
comment on the status of individual units.
That outage accounted for most of the increase in gasoline
prices while adding to the market impact of the Feb. 7 shutdown
of the gasoline-producing unit at Phillips 66's Bayway
Refinery in Linden, New Jersey, the largest on the East Coast.
Repairs there are expected to last until early to mid-March,
according to sources familiar with plant operations.
A company spokesman said planned maintenance was underway.
Over the three-day Presidents Day holiday weekend, the
gasoline-producing units at Houston-area refineries operated by
LyondellBasell Industries and Chevron Corp were
shut, according to refinery sources and Genscape.
Restart timelines for those units were not available from
sources or the companies. Neither Chevron nor Lyondell replied
to requests for comment.
Reformers, which produce octane-boosting components mixed
into gasoline, also were shut at Royal Dutch Shell Plc's
Convent, Louisiana, refinery and Marathon Petroleum
Corp's Galveston Bay Refinery in Texas City, Texas, over the
weekend. Shell declined to comment on the unit's status.
Marathon was not immediately available to comment.
Restart timelines were also unavailable for those units.
(
Reporting by Erwin Seba, additional reporting by Stephanie Kelly
and Laura Sanicola in New York; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)