Just over two years ago, the jet fuel market experienced an almost existential shock. In the space of only six or seven weeks, demand for the refined product plummeted by more than 70% as COVID-related lockdowns and air-travel restrictions were implemented. Fortunately, life in the U.S. has been returning to normal — albeit with some bumps along the way — and demand for jet fuel (a.k.a. “jet”) has been rebounding to near pre-pandemic levels. That re-emphasizes a nagging challenge, though, namely transporting large volumes of jet from refineries and import docks to hundreds of major and minor airports. In today’s RBN blog, we continue our look at jet fuel, this time with an examination of where it's produced and consumed, and how it gets from refineries to airports.
The Future of Fuels bi-annual report by RBN's Refined Fuels Analytics provides an in-depth analysis of the U.S. and global refinery industries, focusing on crude oil and fuel market dynamics, supply and demand, alternative fuels, refinery capacities, and price forecasts to help stakeholders navigate the evolving energy landscape.
As we said in Part 1, the jet fuel market has been on a wild ride since the pandemic started in early 2020. First, demand, prices and production tanked. Then came a slow, uneven recovery that continued through this past winter, when Russia’s war on Ukraine and other factors caused spikes in crude oil and jet fuel prices just as air-traffic volumes were finally returning to normal. We also explained that jet fuel is produced from crude oil at refineries through atmospheric distillation, followed by a series of treatments to remove unwanted elements such as sulfur, nitrogen and metals. And we noted that the U.S. is by far the world’s largest producer of jet fuel, and that while the U.S. is essentially self-sufficient regarding jet fuel — producing about as much as it consumes — we export and import relatively modest (and roughly equal) volumes, mostly because it’s more economic to import jet fuel to some parts of the U.S. than to transport it there from domestic refineries.
Today, we start where we left off. In 2019, the last year before COVID hit, U.S. production of jet fuel averaged a hair below 1.8 MMb/d, with just over half of that output (940 Mb/d, or 52%) occurring in PADD 3 (Gulf Coast; gray line in Figure 1) and the rest split among, in order, PADD 5 (West Coast; light-blue line), with 452 Mb/d, or 25%; PADD 2 (Midwest; orange line), with 272 Mb/d, or 15%; PADD 1 (East Coast; dark-blue line), with 99 Mb/d, or 6%; and PADD 4 (Rockies; yellow line), with 31 Mb/d, or 2%, all according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA).
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About the song
“Jet” was written by Paul and Linda McCartney and appears as the second song on side one of Paul McCartney & Wings’ third studio album, Band on the Run. Released as a single in January 1974, the song — named after the McCartneys’ Labrador Retriever, Jet — went to #7 on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles chart. The song was recorded at Abbey Road Studios in London in September 1973. Personnel on the record were: Paul McCartney (lead vocals, bass, guitar, drums, piano), Linda McCartney (backing vocals, synthesizer), Denny Laine (backing vocals, guitar), Jimmy McCulloch (lead guitar), and Howie Casey (sax).
Band on the Run was recorded between August and October 1973 at EMI and ARC in Lagos, Nigeria; and AIR, Kingsway Recorders and Abbey Road Studios in London. Produced by Paul McCartney, the album was released in December 1973 and went to #1 on the Billboard 200 Albums chart. It has been certified 3x Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America. Three singles were released from the LP. The cover of the album was a photo featuring Wings members Paul McCartney, Linda McCartney and Denny Laine, joined by actors James Coburn, Christopher Lee, Michael Parkinson, Kenny Lynch and Clement Freud, all dressed as convicts caught in a prison yard searchlight.
Paul McCartney & Wings was a British rock band formed in London in 1971 by Paul and Linda McCartney, along with Denny Laine. The band released seven studio albums, one live album, two compilation albums and 29 singles. It won two Ivor Novello Awards and six Grammy Awards. Ten members passed through the band until its breakup in 1981. Wings member Jimmy McCulloch died in June 1979, Linda McCartney in April 1988, and Henry McCullough in June 2016. Paul McCartney continues to record and tour.
