September 16, 2013 [OPIS] - Marathon Petroleum is focused on expanding both its product export capability and increasing its access to eastern product markets in the U.S., Don Templin, the company's CFO, said during Barclays Capital CEO Energy-Power conference on Thursday.
On the Gulf Coast, Marathon is building storage tank capacity to increase exports from its 490,000-b/d Garyville refinery in Louisiana and is in the process of switching some crude feedstock to pipeline from barge in order to free up export capability from Galveston.
Also, Marathon believes it can access previously untapped markets via its 233,000-b/d Catlettsburg refinery in Kentucky, and it could also deliver products from its 206,000-b/d Robinson, Ill., refinery into markets currently supplied by Catlettsburg.
Despite recent volatility, Marathon continues to believe that U.S. crude differentials will be driven transportation cost economics.
On the product front, the company believes a rising refining capacity and a flat to slightly declining gasoline demand could potentially erode product pricing in the U.S.
In light of the company’s outlook, Marathon will focus refining investment on access to advantaged feedstock and yield improvement instead of capacity.
An example of refining investment includes the company’s potential Canton and Catlettsburg condensate splitters, which would increase condensate capacity from the current 25,000 b/d to 60,000 b/d.
Preliminary timing for these condensate splitter projects is 2015-2016 as Marathon continues to monitor Utica production to determine optimal project timing.
