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U.S. government approves Pemex acquisition of Deer Park refinery

Mexico City, Mexico — The United States government has authorized the acquisition of the Deer Park refinery by Pemex from the company, Shell. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador made the recent announcement, saying Pemex will purchase the Houston, Texas refinery.

“This means more capacity to process crude oil, the raw material that is extracted from wells in our country, both land wells and shallow water wells. With this refinery, with the new Dos Bocas refinery and with the Tula coker, we are increasing our refining capacity by around 700,000 barrels per day,” he explained.

He added that in addition to that purchase, about 10 billion peso is being invested to rehabilitate six existing refineries in the country. It is expected that by the end of 2022, all the infrastructure will result in a substantial increase in production.

“We will be in a position to process all of our raw material. Hopefully it can be completed, carried out by 2023, which will mean producing all our fuels in Mexico. It is a turnaround, a very important change in our oil policy and it is very good news.”

The president said that energy self-sufficiency will keep gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and other petroleum product prices low.

During the conference, López Obrador thanked U.S. President Joseph Biden and other American government officials for their confidence in the operation. He also extended a thank you to Shell executives who maintained the refinery in the agreed terms.

Octavio Romero Oropeza, CEO of Petróleos Mexicanos, said that in coming days, the corporate notifications and contracts necessary to close the operation will be finalized.

“Pemex and Shell are working to ensure that all operational and administrative aspects of the refinery function properly after the operation closes.”

He explained that the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit, through the Federation Treasury, has reserved $1.2 billion dollars to make the purchase of the refinery.

Oropeza presented details of the Deer Park refinery, highlighting that it has a processing capacity of 340,000 barrels per day and can commercialize products by ship, pipeline and train.

“It is integrated into Shell’s petrochemical complex in Deer Park, which makes it easy for many of the additional gasoline, diesel and jet fuel products to be marketed in a very agile way and with very little in logistics because they are practically together.

“It has the capacity to commercialize their products by ship, by pipeline and of course by tank cars, by train.”