Q: With the U.S. being so dependent upon oil, why do we export oil to other countries? Also, how much a day is imported/exported?
-- Michael Martin, Marietta
A: The United States consumed more than 19 million barrels per day of petroleum in 2010, making it the world's largest petroleum consumer, Jonathan Cogan, a spokesman with the U.S. Energy Information Administration, told Q&A on the News in an e-mail. "U.S. net imports [imports minus exports] of crude oil and refined petroleum products accounted for 49 percent of our total petroleum consumption in 2010. Because the U.S. also is the world's largest petroleum importer, it may seem surprising that we also export about 2.3 million barrels a day of petroleum, almost all of it in the form of refined petroleum products." Cogan wrote that because of various logistical, regulatory and quality considerations, exporting some barrels and replacing them with imports is the most economic way to meet the market's needs. "For example, refiners in the U.S. Gulf Coast region frequently find that it makes economic sense to export some of their gasoline to Mexico rather than shipping the product to the U.S. East Coast because lower-cost gasoline imports are available from Europe," he wrote. "The small quantity of U.S. crude oil production that was exported in 2010 [less than 1 percent of U.S. crude oil production] all went to Canada, some of which actually returned to the U.S. as refined products."
Lori Johnston wrote this column. Do you have a question about the news? We’ll try to get the answer. Call 404-222-2002 or e-mail q&a@ajc.com (include name, phone and city).
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