THE MORNING RANT: A Little Good News Regarding the Business of Petroleum

Valero to Purchase and Restart a Shuttered Texas Refinery

Although the inflation-adjusted price of gasoline in America is virtually unchanged over the past two decades, it is higher than where it was before the flow of Iranian oil was cut off to global markets. Also contributing to the problem of elevated fuel prices is the lack of refining capacity in the United States. This is especially true regarding diesel. The carbon hysteria of the past few decades, along with Democrat administrations’ war on petroleum has dissuaded capital investment in new refineries.

With that background, there was some great news announced this past week – Texas-based Valero Energy is purchasing a mothballed refinery in Houston.

The refinery had previously been operated by Dutch chemical company Lyondell, but in obedience to the E.U.’s anti-carbon “net zero” obsession, Lyondell shut the plant down after announcing its closure in 2022. The puppet-masters of the Biden administration were so passionately anti-petroleum that mothballing the refinery was also a way for Lyondell to help gain regulatory favor for its ongoing U.S. chemical operations.

“Valero to Buy, Restart Idled Texas Refinery as Fuel Rallies” [Bloomberg – 10/30/2026]

The pure-play oil refiner plans to restart 165,000 barrels of daily light, sweet crude processing capacity by the end of 2027 at the former LyondellBasell Industries NV facility, according to a press release Friday. The $320.5 million deal with Lyondell is expected to close by the end of the year, Valero said. The plant sits adjacent to a Valero refinery that’s capable of processing more than 200,000 barrels of oil each day.

This refinery can produce diesel and jet fuel in addition to gasoline. Production will re-start in 2027.

BP’s CEO on Renewables Debacle: “We Have Not Been Careful Stewards of Shareholder Capital”

Meanwhile, another European petroleum corporation that tried to pivot into being a “clean” energy company is taking a massive write-down on that failed endeavor. Fortunately for British Petroleum, its traditional refining is producing solid profit to help offset the losses from its pretend-energy division.

“BP Flags Up to $4.5 Billion in Impairments as Refining Margins Jump” [Yahoo Finance – 10/13/2026]

BP expects to take between $3 billion and $4.5 billion in post-tax impairment charges in the third quarter of 2026, primarily related to its energy transition businesses, even as stronger refining margins provide a significant earnings boost.

To abide with the edicts of the European state religion (The Sustainable Organic Church of the Carbon Apocalypse), BP had even started to claim that its initials stood for “Beyond Petroleum.” BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 was during the time that BP was promoting itself as being “beyond petroleum.” What this revealed is that the anti-carbon activists running BP were distracted by the “renewables” nonsense and had become indifferent to responsibly running a petroleum company.

With BP taking this new $4.5 billion write-off for failed “renewables” projects, its current CEO, Meg O’Neill, is acknowledging that “We have not been careful stewards of shareholder capital.”

While Ms. O’Neill has a regrettable history of voicing support for Net Zero goals, she has also hedged on timelines, as well as the practicality of reducing carbon output without natural gas. It would be so refreshing if oil company executives would start fully and unabashedly advocating for the product their industry produces, rather than pandering to enviro-communist politicians who want to eliminate the companies they head.

Other Stuff I’m Writing About

My latest piece at the The American Spectator has been published. “Repeated Ethical Shortcomings at Instacart Hamper the Task of Those Defending Capitalism” discusses Instacart’s persistent ethical transgressions, including:

• Illegal hiring practices that exclude U.S. citizens.

• Surveillance pricing that charges customers different amounts for the exact same product from the same store.

• The use of unvetted, sub-contract labor.

Those of us who defend the prosperity brought about by free markets have always had our work cut out for us, because socialists promise “free everything” by the confiscation of others’ wealth. To make our economic case, we need businesses to operate as good corporate citizens, consistent with America’s historic culture of being a high-trust society. The motivation for a corporation to refrain from deceptive trade practices should not be the fear of legal consequences. Ethical behavior should be the default. Similarly, non-exploitative employment practices should be the expectation of Western capitalism, not something that must be compelled.

This piece is not behind a paywall. I’d be honored if you’d give it a read.

[buck.throckmorton at protonmail dot com]

posted by Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM

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