Marathon’s Galveston Bay Refinery Cuts Production Following Compressor Outage

Diesel and gasoline production was cut by about a third at Marathon Petroleum Corp’s (MPC.N) 593,000-barrel-per-day (bpd) Galveston Bay Refinery in Texas City, Texas, following a key compressor outage on Thursday, sources familiar with plant operations said on Friday.

Marathon spokesman Jamal Kheiry declined to comment.

The key hydroprocessing compressor, which is used by the refinery’s diesel-producing hydrocracker and two reformers, is being repaired after shutting down on Thursday, the sources said.

Marathon hopes to complete the repairs to the compressor over the weekend, the sources said.

The 60,000-bpd diesel-producing hydrocracker, called the Ultracracker, shut down and restarted on Thursday but at reduced production because of the compressor outage, the sources said.

The 75,000 Ultraformer 3 reformer and 65,000-bpd Ultraformer 4 reformer were cut back, as was the 140,000-bpd gasoline-producing fluidic catalytic cracker 3 (FCC 3), according to the sources.

Reformers convert refining by-products into octane-boosting components added to make finished grades of gasoline.

Marathon is the largest U.S. refiner by capacity. The Galveston Bay Refinery is the second-largest in the United States.

(Reporting by Erwin Seba; Editing by Jonathan Oatis, Dan Grebler, and Cynthia Osterman)