Mexico City — Valero, one of the largest oil refiners in the United States, will begin storing gasoline and diesel in a fuel terminal in Altamira, in the northeastern Mexican state of Tamaulipas from October, the company’s CEO Carlos García.
In an interview with Bloomberg Línea, Garcia said “the terminal will be operational by that date”.
The terminal was built by OTM and has a storage capacity of 1.1 million barrels of gasoline, diesel and MTBE additive, and cost $120 million. The project includes two bays for loading pipes and discharging 25,000 barrels per day.
García explained that operational tests will begin with the arrival of a fuel tanker in September.
The US company expects to close the year with a storage capacity of five million barrels distributed in terminals located in Mexico City, Veracruz, Puebla and Tamaulipas, while continuing to develop projects in Nuevo León and Jalisco states.
Valero’s CEO added that the company already operates 220 gas stations in 17 states in the country, from which it sells fuel, and is the largest private importer of gasoline and diesel in Mexico. Other fuel-importing companies include ExxonMobil, Koch, Marathon and Shell.
Valero has storage capacity with infrastructure companies such as NuStar, Sempra Infraestructura and Grupo Mexico.
Private companies imported 218,000 barrels per day of gasoline and diesel during February, while state-owned oil company Pemex imported 754,000 barrels per day of both fuels, according to Energy Ministry data.
Valero operates in a market tightened by the Mexican government in order to benefit Pemex, with the energy ministry reducing the granting of import permits by more than 90% since the current government took office in 2018.
More storage permits
The main challenge Garcia sees in the Mexican fuel market is the granting of more permits for storage terminals by the Energy Regulatory Commission (CRE), because fuel inventories contribute to the country’s energy security.
“It is very important to see these opportunities. There are many interested parties and projects on the storage table, and the government should be promoting storage,” García said during his participation in an energy forum organized by Mexico’s Senate.
Mexico’s Organization of Petroleum Retailers (Onexpo) reported in March that there is a backlog of more than 8,000 pending matters at the CRE with “contradictory” elements in an agreement regarding the regulator’s legal terms and deadlines after the Covid-19 pandemic.
CRE commissioners have even denounced more than a hundred irregularities in the permits already approved.