Phillips 66 may delay planned maintenance at its Wood River, Illinois, refinery as an outage at BP’s refinery near Chicago has driven up regional profit margins, Bloomberg reports. Refining margins in the Chicago area reached a seven-year high on Aug. 12 after BP shut down the largest crude unit at its Whiting, Indiana, refinery, knocking out as much as 140,000 barrels per day of gasoline output.
Other refiners could delay maintenance even as the summer driving season wanes. Bloomberg reports that at least other six other Midwest refineries are set to begin maintenance over the next two months. The crude unit at BP’s Whiting refinery could be down for a least a month, according to recent reports.
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