Russian oil to arrive on West Coast soon

Petroleum News Staff

Tesoro Petroleum Corp.’s Golden Eagle refinery near Martinez, Calif., will receive the first-ever shipment of Russian crude oil to a West Coast port when 1 million barrels of crude from the Urals region arrives in mid-May, Tesoro spokeswoman Tara Ford said. In 2001, the last year for which data is available, California received about 29 percent of its oil from foreign sources with Iraq being California’s largest foreign supplier (8.4 percent) and the balance coming from Saudi Arabia, Ecuador and Mexico. Reduced Russian demand has in part spurred that country’s oil companies to boost exports, especially to the United States, the world’s largest oil consumer.