Bakken pushing Nigerian crude out of U.S. market

Cheaper crude oil supplies from domestic sources such as the Bakken, as well as two idle East Coast refineries, helped cut Nigerian exports to the United States by more than half over the past year, according to figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

The African nation exported just 449,000 barrels per day of oil into the U.S. in January 2012, down 54 percent from 519,000 bpd in January 2011 and the lowest monthly rate since 2002, according to the statistical arm of the U.S. Department of Energy. And preliminary data suggests the decline continued in February and March of this year.

The decline is coming primarily from Gulf Coast refineries switching to cheaper domestic supplies of crude oil, according to the EIA.

“Given the growing production from the Bakken and Eagle Ford formations and associated transportation constraints, these inland crudes have been selling at a discount to waterborne crudes on the Gulf Coast, providing refiners in that area further incentive to switch from imported crude to inland, domestically-produced crude when available,” the agency noted in a briefing.

A third of the decline, however, can be traced to two Philadelphia-area refineries idled in the second half of last year, the EIA said. ConocoPhillips’ Trainer refinery and Sunoco’s Marcus Hook refinery imported 173,000 bpd of Nigerian crude in January 2011.

—Eric Lidji

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