Mexican President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador will seek to end the
country’s massive fuel imports, nearly all from the United States,
during the first three years of his term while also boosting refining at
home.
“The objective is that we stop buying foreign gasoline by the half way
point of my six-year term,” said Lopez Obrador, repeating a position he
and his senior energy advisor staked out during the campaign.
“We are going to immediately revive our oil activity, exploration and the drilling of wells so we have crude oil,” he said.
On the campaign trail, the leftist former mayor of Mexico City pitched
his plan to wean the country off foreign gasoline as a means to
increasing domestic production of crude and value-added fuels, not as a
trade issue with the United States.
Mexican President-elected Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador greats to
supporters as he arrives to a meeting with his new cabinet in Mexico
City, Mexico July 7, 2018. REUTERS/Daniel Becerril
Lopez Obrador also reiterated on Saturday his goal to build either one
large or two medium-sized oil refineries during his term, which begins
on December 1.
While he said the facilities will be built in the Gulf coast states of
Tabasco and possibly Campeche, he has been less clear on how the
multi-billion-dollar refineries would be funded.
So far this year, Mexico has imported an average of about 590,000
barrels per day (bpd) of gasoline and another 232,000 bpd of diesel, as
output at the country’s domestic refineries has steadily declined.
Foreign gasoline imports have grown by nearly two-thirds, while diesel
imports have more than doubled since 2013, the first year of outgoing
President Enrique Pena Nieto’s term, according to data from national oil
company Pemex.
Meanwhile, the six oil refineries in Mexico owned and operated by Pemex
are producing at far below their capacity, or an average of 220,000 bpd
of gasoline so far this year.
Gasoline production at the facilities is down 50 percent compared to
2013, and domestic gasoline output only accounts for slightly more than a
quarter of national demand from the country’s legions of motorists.
Mexican President-elected Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador greats to
supporters as he arrives to a meeting with his new cabinet in Mexico
City, Mexico July 7, 2018. REUTERS/Daniel Becerril
During the campaign, the two-time presidential runner-up also promised
to strengthen Pemex. He also was sharply critical of a 2013
constitutional energy overhaul that ended the company’s monopoly and
allowed international oil majors to operate fields on their own for the
first time in decades.
The overhaul was designed to reverse a 14-year-long oil output slide and
has already resulted in competitive auctions that have awarded more
than 100 exploration and production contracts to the likes of Royal
Dutch Shell and ExxonMobil.
“What’s most important is to resolve the problem of falling crude oil
production. We’re extracting very little oil,” said Lopez Obrador.
During the first five months of this year, Mexican crude oil production
averaged about 1.9 million bpd, a dramatic drop compared to peak output
of nearly 3.4 million bpd in 2004, or 2.5 million bpd in 2013.
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