Total domestic petroleum deliveries in July experienced the largest year-to-year drop for this measure of U.S. demand in three-and-a-half years. Deliveries dropped 3 percent for July versus a year earlier. Gasoline deliveries, in particular, fell 0.8 percent under the influence of higher retail prices. Contrasting with 2004, when gasoline deliveries had risen nearly 2 percent, deliveries for the year to date in 2005 have been nearly flat.
Residual fuel oil deliveries were also down because of apparent fuel switching to other fuels by electric utilities and industrial users in the face of higher petroleum prices. Resid deliveries fell 27 percent for the month. However, deliveries of distillate fuel oil and jet fuel both continued to show increases.
U.S. refineries focused heavily on distillate production in July -- registering an increase in production of more than 7 percent over last July's level. Distillate's record production was achieved even though overall refinery inputs were down 2.2 percent from last July's. Production of low-sulfur diesel, the type required for on-highway use, rose 2.8 percent to a July record of 3.08 million barrels per day, and output of high-sulfur distillate jumped more than 20 percent to 1.1 million barrels per day. Gasoline production for July fell 2.7 percent to 8.62 million barrels per day, reflecting weaker demand and the availability of imports. Utilization rates for this July were still strong at nearly 94 percent of capacity, but this was down from an even higher 96.8 percent in July 2004.
Month-end crude oil inventories slipped by 4 million barrels from June to July, but at 319 million barrels, remained some 23 million barrels above the five-year average. Gasoline inventories fell below 210 million barrels for the first time since October, ending July at 208.5 million barrels, slightly below the recent-year average for the first time this year. But distillate inventories rose by a strong 11 million barrels in July over June to 126 million barrels, and were up 4 million barrels from July 2004.
Total petroleum imports for July were above 13.0 million barrels per day for the fourth consecutive month, but were 1.5 percent lower than for July 2004. Total motor gasoline imports, including blending components, were over 1.0 million barrels per day for the third time this year at 1.08 million barrels per day, but were about 7 percent lower than for one year earlier. Despite growing demand, distillate fuel imports remained relatively
2 low, down 18 percent from July 2004. With weaker demand, resid imports also shrank from year-ago levels.
Domestic crude production in July fell by 4.2 percent from June’s level, the fifth monthto-month decline this year. This was the steepest month-to-month percentage decline since September 2004 and the fifth largest in at least 35 years. Precautionary shut-ins because of tropical storms in the Gulf, combined with down time in Alaska, both
contributed to the decline. Production in July, at 5.18 million barrels per day, was down 5.1 percent from the year-ago level.
