Pemex revealed that it has invested $ 596 million in the purchase of the Deer Park refinery in Houston, Texas

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador reported on the purchase of the Deer Park refinery in Houston, Texas, owned by Shell.

“We will report on the purchase of the shares of the Deer Park refinery, located in Houston, Texas, which is owned by Shell, and that we have already started the acquisition process so that this refinery becomes part of the assets of our country, which belongs to Mexico“Pemex board members will be briefed and invited,” said the Mexican president.

The investment was $ 596 million, explained the director of Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex), Octavio Romero Oropeza.

According to Romero Oropeza, The origin of the purchase dates back to August 2020 when Shell announced that it would sell some of its refineries that were not strategically located, the case of the Deer Park refinery.

The director of Pemex informed the Mexican president of the announcement, and according to Romero Oropeza, López Obrador has agreed to start negotiations for the purchase, on one condition, he said, that as long as it is located in Houston, Texas,

“It originated in August 2020, upon the announcement of Shell to sell some of its refineries … the president’s response was in the affirmative but conditional on the acquisition of precisely that of Deer Park, one of which Shell was unwilling to sell, ”said the director of Pemex.

After months of negotiations, the deal has been completed, which also includes the inventory of crude oil and petroleum products, will consist of $ 106 million in cash and $ 490 million in Shell debt, Romero Oropeza said.

Pemex, although it already owned half of the shares in said refinery, did not control it, so it did not This generated profits for Mexico, as the profits generated were reinvested in the complex, explained López Obrador.

“Pemex had a significant stake, but it did not have control of the refinery, the refinery was still controlled by Shell, and that led to the reinvestment of the profits in the refinery itself, there was no profit, that’s what I meant.

From now on, Pemex will have control of the refinery, where it is in the process of being concluded, but all the documents have already been signed, the operation has been closed, ”he said.

López Obrador assured that the purchase is with the aim of achieving self-sufficiency in fuels, also reiterated that in the future, Mexico will no longer sell crude oil abroad, but the extraction will be for consumption in the domestic market.

“It is important to know that we have become the oil country in the world that buys the most gasoline and other oil products abroad, So now a shift is underway, technocrats would say a paradigm shift or a new business plan, we won’t sell crude oil in the future, or buy gasoline, Pemex will have the ability to produce fuels that are sold in the country. , with the aim of being self-sufficient, not being addicted and also ensuring that the price of gasoline and diesel does not increase.

In general, It is important that we are all informed that even though we have discovered three large deposits, we have enough raw materialWe are not going to extract more than what we need in our internal market, because it is a non-renewable resource that we must take care of and that we must leave as a legacy for new generations, so we have to extract over three million barrels per day, but we have decided not to produce two million barrels per day ”, iinformed the Mexican president.

The Pemex executive explained that Pemex held 49.95% of the shares after an association in 1993 with Shell, which controlled the remaining 50.05% and that it planned to complete the transaction in the last quarter of this year.

The refinery has a capacity of 340,000 barrels per day, including 110,000 for gasoline, 90,000 for diesel, 90,000 for jet fuel and the rest of the other products, said the director of Pemex.

The purchase drew criticism as Shell announced last February it was shutting down the Deer Park plant because it could not afford it and as part of a restructuring plan to sell half of its refineries for the energy transition.

The “rescue” of the state and the oil company is one of the main bets of López Obrador, who reiterated the goal of producing 1.8 million barrels per day of fuel to be used exclusively for gasoline intended for national consumption.

The state-owned oil company lost $ 21,417 million in 2020 in “the greatest crisis” in its history, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, as the company itself admitted, which at first quarter 2021 still recorded losses of $ 1,813 million.

Despite this, Pemex’s board of directors unanimously approved the purchase and came forward in its defense at the press conference.

“We consider that this is an excellent initiative supported by the technical expert groups of Pemex which increases immediately and, above all, at very low cost, the processing of crude oil and the production of petroleum products”, said declared Minister Laura Itzel Castillo.

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