ASIA TO REMAIN A GROWING SINK FOR THE CRUDE MARKET

FGE’s Grayson Lim reports on the trends in Asia’s crude markets The rapid economic development in Asia has resulted in strong oil demand growth in recent decades. In tandem with this, close to 13.3 million bpd of refining capacity was added during 2010-2020. Despite the current subdued state of refining business largely due to the COVID-19 crisis, around 3.1 million bpd of refining capacity is expected to come on stream in Asia by 2025. Most of these projects started construction before the onset of the pandemic. China has been leading the refining capacity growth in Asia and will continue doing so in the coming years. In fact, by the end of 2021, China is expected to overtake the US as the country with the most amount of installed refining capacity. Moreover, three new mega refineries totaling 1.2 million bpd are expected to be brought online by 2023. Elsewhere in Asia, refinery expansions will contribute to the growing crude processing capacity in the region.   IMPORT DECLINE AND RECOVERY The growth in Asian crude demand has far exceeded incremental production, resulting in the widening of the regional deficit in recent years. Asia’s crude and condensate...