The Vice President of China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Association, Fu Xiangsheng, says China’s oil refining capacity expanded to 920 million tonnes per year, or 18.4 million barrels per day (bpd), making it the world’s largest in 2022.
According to the International Energy Agency’s latest oil market report, that compares with U.S. refining capacity as of December 2022 at 17.6 million bpd, though China’s production of fuel products lagged the United States due to low utilisation rates.
China’s recent wave of refinery expansions has been led by state-run PetroChina and large private firms such as Zhejiang Rongsheng group and Jiangsu Shenghong Petrochemical, mainly to fill a supply gap in petrochemicals rather than transportation fuels.
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China’s total refined products output last year was less than 700 million tonnes (5.1 billion barrels), at an average plant utilisation rate of around 70%, the association said, compared with more than 800 million tonnes in the United States, where average utilisation exceeded 90%.
China has 32 refineries with at least 200,000 bpd capacity each, according to the association, citing the launch of a new facility built by PetroChina in Jieyang in Guangdong province as a recent example of the country’s growing capacity.
Zainab Sa’id
