Petroleum products

Crude oil net imports
In our forecast, a combination of increasing domestic crude oil production and decreasing U.S. refinery runs means reduced net imports of crude oil next year. We forecast that net imports of crude oil into the United States will fall to 1.9 million barrels per day (b/d) in 2025, down from 2.5 million b/d this year, and the least crude oil net imports in a year since 1971. Total U.S. crude oil production in our forecast increases by 0.3 million b/d in 2025. At the same time, we expect U.S. refineries will process 0.2 million b/d less crude oil next year, down to 16.0 million b/d.

Net imports of crude oil this year have remained close to 2023 volumes because increasing U.S. crude oil production has met an almost equivalent increase in U.S. refinery runs. We do not forecast gross imports or gross exports, but we can look at historical data to better understand the forecast for net imports. U.S. imports of crude oil from Canada have remained strong this year. Our forecasts from earlier in 2024 had assumed exports from Canada’s Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion, which was completed in mid-2024, would mostly be sent to China. However, because of slowing oil demand growth in China, most of the crude oil from the Trans Mountain pipeline has gone to refineries on the U.S. West Coast. Data from July 2024 showed the most U.S. imports of crude oil since June 2019, at more than 7.1 million b/d, and imports this year have been similar to 2023. At the same time, U.S. exports of crude oil through 3Q24 have been similar, on average, to exports during the same period in 2023. These factors contributed to net imports in 2024 remaining about the same as 2023. Despite these recent trends, we forecast net imports will decrease next year because of the increase in crude oil production will likely lead to rising crude oil exports. A decrease in refinery runs because of a reduction in U.S. refinery capacity will also contribute to lower crude oil net imports in 2025. Although the United States is a net importer of crude oil, we are a net exporter of petroleum products overall.

Jet fuel stocks
After reaching a six-year high in August, U.S. jet fuel stocks will generally decline through 2025, reversing a trend of generally rising stocks over the past two years. Consumption of jet fuel remained below pre-pandemic levels this year and declined compared with 2023 in some months, resulting in stock builds. In addition, rising jet fuel yields and production on the U.S. West Coast contributed to record-high jet fuel stocks in the region this summer. Next year, however, we forecast U.S. jet fuel stocks will decline because of both growing consumption and less refinery production of jet fuel following U.S. refinery closures. Jet fuel refinery yields will also decline as refiners shift production toward distillate fuel oil, consumption of which we expect to grow more than jet fuel, reducing jet fuel production. We forecast that jet fuel stocks will fall by more than 5 million barrels (12%) from August 2024 to August 2025. If realized, this decline will be close to the largest drawdown in jet fuel stocks over any one-year period in the past 10 years. We forecast that jet fuel stocks will fall below 40 million barrels by the end of 2025, which will be the least since November 2023.

We expect these large stock withdrawals will increase jet fuel crack spreads (the difference between petroleum product prices and crude oil prices). We forecast the jet fuel crack spread will increase to 51 cents per gallon (gal) next year, up from 46 cents/gal in 2024.