About Valero Energy
Valero Energy Corporation (Valero) operates as a multinational manufacturer and marketer of petroleum-based and low-carbon liquid transportation fuels and petrochemical products. The company sells its products primarily in the United States (U.S.), Canada, the United Kingdom (U.K.), Ireland, and Latin America. The company owns 15 petroleum refineries located in the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. with a combined throughput capacity of approximately 3.2 million barrels per day (BPD). The company is a joint venture member in DGD1, which owns two renewable diesel plants located in the Gulf Coast region of the U.S. with a combined production capacity of approximately 1.2 billion gallons per year. The company owns 12 ethanol plants located in the Mid-Continent region of the U.S. with a combined production capacity of approximately 1.6 billion gallons per year. Segments The company operates through three segments: Refining, Renewable Diesel, and Ethanol. The company’s Refining segment, which includes the operations of its petroleum refineries, the associated activities to market its refined petroleum products, and the logistics assets that support those operations. The company’s Renewable Diesel segment, which includes the operations of DGD and the associated activities to market renewable diesel and renewable naphtha. The company’s Ethanol segment, which includes the operations of its ethanol plants and the associated activities to market its ethanol and co-products. Refining segment Refineries The company’s 15 petroleum refineries are located in the U.S., Canada, and the U.K.; and they have a combined feedstock throughput capacity of approximately 3.2 million BPD. California Benicia Refinery. The company’s Benicia Refinery is located northeast of San Francisco on the Carquinez Straits of San Francisco Bay. It processes the company’s crude oils into California Reformulated Gasoline Blendstock for Oxygenate Blending (CARBOB) and Conventional Blendstock for Oxygenate Blending (CBOB) gasolines, CARB diesel, diesel, jet fuel, and asphalt. Gasoline production is primarily CARBOB, which meets CARB specifications when blended with ethanol. The refinery receives feedstocks via a marine dock and pipelines and distributes most of its products via pipeline and truck. Wilmington Refinery. The company’s Wilmington Refinery is located near Los Angeles. It processes a blend of heavy and high-sulfur crude oils and produces CARBOB and CBOB gasolines, CARB diesel, diesel, jet fuel, and asphalt. The refinery receives feedstocks via pipelines connected to marine terminals and docks and distributes its products via pipeline to various terminals. Louisiana Meraux Refinery. The company’s Meraux Refinery is located approximately 15 miles southeast of New Orleans on the Mississippi River. It processes the company’s and sweet crude oils and produces gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, and high-sulfur fuel oil. The refinery receives feedstocks at its dock and has access to the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port and distributes its products via its dock and the Colonial Pipeline. The refinery is located about 40 miles from the company’s St. Charles Refinery, allowing for integration of feedstocks and refined petroleum product blending. St. Charles Refinery. The company’s St. Charles Refinery is located approximately 25 miles west of New Orleans on the Mississippi River. It processes the company’s crude oils and other feedstocks and produces gasoline and diesel. The refinery receives feedstocks via its docks and has access to the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port and distributes its products via its docks and the company’s Parkway Pipeline and the Bengal Pipeline, both of which access the Plantation Pipeline and Colonial Pipeline. Oklahoma Ardmore Refinery. The company’s Ardmore Refinery is located approximately 100 miles south of Oklahoma City. It processes primarily sweet crude oils and produces gasoline and diesel. The refinery receives feedstocks via pipelines and distributes its products via rail, truck, and the Magellan Pipeline system. Tennessee Memphis Refinery. The company’s Memphis Refinery is located on the Mississippi River. It processes primarily sweet crude oils and produces gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel. The refinery receives feedstocks via the Diamond Pipeline, the Dakota Access Pipeline, and barge and distributes its products via truck, barge, and the Shorthorn Pipeline. Texas Corpus Christi East and West Refineries. The company’s Corpus Christi East and West Refineries are located on the Corpus Christi Ship Channel. The East Refinery processes the company’s crude oil and the West Refinery processes sweet crude oil, the company’s crude oil, and residual fuel oil, and both refineries produce gasoline, aromatics, jet fuel, diesel, and asphalt. The refineries receive feedstocks via docks on the Corpus Christi Ship Channel and pipelines. The refineries’ physical locations allow for the transfer of various feedstocks and blending components between them. The refineries distribute their products via truck, ship, barge, and pipeline. Houston Refinery. The company’s Houston Refinery is located on the Houston Ship Channel. It processes sweet crude and intermediate oils and produces gasoline, jet fuel, and diesel. The refinery receives feedstocks via pipeline, ship, and barge and distributes its products via pipeline, including the Colonial Pipeline and Explorer Pipeline. McKee Refinery. The company’s McKee Refinery is located in the Texas Panhandle. It processes primarily sweet crude oils and produces gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, and asphalt. The refinery receives feedstocks via pipeline and distributes its products primarily via pipeline and rail. Port Arthur Refinery. The company’s Port Arthur Refinery is located on the Texas Gulf Coast approximately 90 miles east of Houston. It processes heavy the company’s crude oils and other feedstocks and produces gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, and residual fuel oil. The refinery receives feedstocks via rail, ship, barge, and pipeline and distributes its products via pipeline, including the Colonial Pipeline and Explorer Pipeline, and via ship and barge. The refinery’s new coker was completed in the second quarter of 2023. Texas City Refinery. The company’s Texas City Refinery is located southeast of Houston on the Texas City Ship Channel. It processes crude oils and produces gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel. The refinery receives feedstocks via pipeline and by ship and barge using docks on the Texas City Ship Channel and distributes its products via ship and barge, as well as via pipeline, including the Colonial Pipeline and Explorer Pipeline. Three Rivers Refinery. The company’s Three Rivers Refinery is located in South Texas between Corpus Christi and San Antonio. It primarily processes sweet crude oils and produces gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, and aromatics. The refinery receives feedstocks via pipeline and truck and distributes its products primarily via pipeline. Canada Quebec Refinery. The company’s Quebec Refinery is located in Levis (near Quebec City). It processes sweet crude oils and produces gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, heating oil, and low-sulfur fuel oil. The refinery receives feedstocks via ship at its marine dock on the St. Lawrence River (some of which is sourced from the company’s crude oil terminal in Montreal that receives crude oil from western Canada) and distributes its products via its pipeline to the company’s Montreal East terminal and other terminals and via rail, ship, and truck. The U.K. Pembroke Refinery. The company’s Pembroke Refinery is located in the County of Pembrokeshire in South West Wales. It processes primarily sweet crude oils and produces gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, heating oil, and low-sulfur fuel oil. The refinery receives its feedstocks via ship and barge through docks on the Milford Haven Waterway and distributes its products via ship, barge, truck, and the company’s Mainline Pipeline. Feedstock Supply The company’s crude oil and other feedstocks are purchased through a combination of term and spot contracts. The company’s term supply contracts are at market-related prices and feedstocks are purchased directly or indirectly from various national oil companies, as well as international and the U.S. oil companies. Marketing segment The company sells refined petroleum products in both the wholesale rack and bulk markets. These sales include products that are manufactured in the company’s refining operations, as well as products purchased or received on exchange from third parties. Most of the company’s refineries have access to marine facilities, and they interconnect with common-carrier pipeline systems, allowing the company to sell products in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Ireland, Latin America, and other parts of the world. Wholesale Rack Sales The company sells its products on a wholesale basis through an extensive rack marketing network. The principal purchasers of the company’s products from terminal truck racks are wholesalers, distributors, retailers, and truck-delivered end users throughout the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Ireland, and Latin America. The majority of the company’s rack volume is sold through unbranded channels. The remainder is sold to distributors and dealers that are members of the Valero family of brands that operate branded sites in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Ireland, and Mexico. These sites are independently owned and are supplied by the company under multi-year contracts. Approximately 7,000 outlets carry the company’s brand names. For branded sites, products are sold under the Valero, Beacon, Diamond Shamrock, and Shamrock brands in the U.S., the Ultramar brand in Canada, the Valero and Texaco brands in the U.K. and Ireland, and the Valero brand in Mexico. Bulk Sales The company also sells its products through bulk sales channels in the U.S. and international markets. The company’s bulk sales are made to various petroleum companies, traders, and bulk end users, such as railroads, airlines, and utilities. The company’s bulk sales are distributed primarily via pipeline, ship, and barge to major tank farms and trading hubs. Logistics The company owns logistics assets (crude oil pipelines, product pipelines, terminals, tanks, marine docks, truck rack bays, and other assets) that support its refining operations and export capabilities. Demand for transportation fuels in Latin America is expected to continue to grow. To support the company’s wholesale rack operations in Latin America, the company has invested in or grown its access to terminals in Mexico and Peru. The company’s U.S. Gulf Coast refineries are well positioned to support export growth to Latin America, and all of the company’s refineries with waterborne access are well positioned to support export growth in other countries around the world. Renewable Diesel Relationship with DGD DGD is a joint venture that the company consolidates. The company entered into the DGD joint venture in 2011 and it began operations in 2013. The company operates DGD’s renewable diesel plants and performs certain management functions for DGD as an independent contractor under an agreement with DGD. Renewable Diesel Plants DGD owns two renewable diesel plants. The first DGD plant began operations in 2013 and is located next to the company’s St. Charles Refinery (the DGD St. Charles Plant). The second DGD plant commenced operations in the fourth quarter of 2022 and is located next to the company’s Port Arthur Refinery (the DGD Port Arthur Plant, and together with the DGD St. Charles Plant, the DGD Plants). The DGD Plants produce renewable diesel and renewable naphtha. Renewable diesel is a low-carbon liquid transportation fuel that is interchangeable with petroleum-based diesel. Renewable naphtha is used to produce renewable gasoline and renewable plastics. These products are produced from waste and renewable feedstocks using a pre-treatment process and an advanced hydroprocessing-isomerization process. The market value of the renewable diesel can vary based on regional policies, feedstock preferences, and CI scores. Waste feedstocks (predominantly animal fats, used cooking oils, and inedible distillers corn oils) are the preferred feedstocks due to their lower CI scores; however, vegetable oils and other renewable feedstocks are also used. While several other companies have made, or have announced interest in making, investments in renewable diesel projects, the DGD Plants are two of only a small number of operational facilities that have the capacity to process 100 percent waste and renewable feedstocks, and this feedstock flexibility provides a margin advantage. The DGD Plants receive waste and renewable feedstocks primarily by rail, trucks, ships, and barges owned by third parties. DGD is party to a raw material supply agreement with Darling under which Darling is obligated to offer to DGD a portion of its feedstock requirements at market pricing, but DGD is not obligated to purchase all or any part of its feedstock from Darling. Therefore, DGD pursues the most optimal feedstock supply available. DGD began an expansion of the DGD St. Charles Plant in 2019 and operations commenced in the fourth quarter of 2021. This expansion increased the DGD St. Charles Plant’s renewable diesel production capacity by approximately 410 million gallons per year, which, at that time, brought DGD’s renewable diesel production capacity to approximately 700 million gallons per year, and provided DGD with the ability to produce approximately 30 million gallons per year of renewable naphtha. The DGD Port Arthur Plant, which has a production capacity of approximately 470 million gallons of renewable diesel and approximately 20 million gallons of renewable naphtha per year, commenced operations in the fourth quarter of 2022. DGD’s combined renewable diesel and renewable naphtha production capacities increased to approximately 1.2 billion gallons and 50 million gallons, respectively, per year. Marketing DGD sells renewable diesel and renewable naphtha under the Diamond Green Diesel brand primarily to be blended with petroleum-based diesel and gasoline, respectively, and to end users for use in their operations. DGD distributes its renewable diesel and renewable naphtha via ship and rail domestically and to international markets. Ethanol Ethanol Plants The company’s ethanol business began in 2009 with the purchase of its first ethanol plants. The company has since grown the business by purchasing additional ethanol plants. The company’s 12 ethanol plants are located in the Mid-Continent region of the U.S., and they have a combined ethanol production capacity of approximately 1.6 billion gallons per year. The company’s ethanol plants are dry mill facilities that process corn to produce ethanol and various co-products, including livestock feed (dry distillers grains, or DDGs, and syrup) and inedible distillers corn oils. The company sources its corn supply from local farmers and commercial elevators. The company’s plants receive corn primarily via rail and truck. Marketing The company sells its ethanol under term and spot contracts in bulk markets in the U.S. The company also exports its ethanol into the global markets and has access to logistics assets that are well positioned to support export growth. The company distributes its ethanol primarily by rail (using some railcars owned by the company), truck, ship, and barge. The company sells DDGs primarily to animal feed customers in the U.S., Mexico, and Asia, which are distributed primarily via rail, truck, ship, and barge. Seasonality Demand for gasoline, diesel, and asphalt is higher during the spring and summer months than during the winter months in most of the company’s markets, primarily due to seasonal increases in highway traffic and construction. History The company was founded in 1980. It was incorporated in Delaware in 1981 under the name Valero Refining and Marketing Company. The company changed its name to Valero Energy Corporation in 1997.
