Reformate

Over the past five years, the price differential between regular and premium gasoline has been widening steadily.  According to the Energy Information Administration (EIA), as of July 2017 the premium -vs.-regular differential reached $0.53/gallon — more than double the differential in 2012. This has produced cringe-worthy experiences at the pump for consumers requiring the premium grade and an incentive for refiners to optimize the gasoline pool.  Consequently, refiners have been making operational adjustments and capital investments to squeeze additional high-octane components out of their feedstocks. Today we examine the premium-regular gasoline differential, provide a primer on gasoline blendstocks and octane levels, and discuss some contributing factors to the widening divide between the pump prices of 87- and 93-octane gasoline.

Reformate is a blending component that makes up about 30 percent of US gasoline supplies. It is also an important source of aromatics used as feedstocks for the petrochemicals industry. Ongoing changes in the US crude oil slate are reducing the volume of heavy naphtha available to feed catalytic reformer units that make reformate. At the same time better economics for lighter ethane feedstock are reducing the volume of aromatics produced as byproducts of olefin cracking. The result is a shortage of the aromatic materials used to produce a number of petrochemical intermediates such as polymers and fibers. But more changes are coming to the reformate market due to reductions in the use of reformate in gasoline.  Today we look at the changing role of reformate.