Feb 28, 2012:

TOKYO- Japan's top oil refiner JX Nippon Oil & Energy Corp plans to refine 5.89 million kilolitres (1.20 million barrels per day) of crude oil in March for domestic consumption, up 21 percent from a year earlier, a company executive said on Tuesday. The sharp year-on-year increase is largely due to the disruption in the firm's operations after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, said Tsutomu Sugimori, senior vice president in charge of retail fuel sales.

Several plants were badly damaged by the disaster and have yet to return to full capacity. In March 2010, the company refined 8 percent more crude than the 2012 forecast.  JX Nippon estimated it had refined 5.53 million kl of crude for domestic consumption in February, a 3 percent drop from last year. That figure includes volumes processed at its 140,000-bpd Sendai refinery which was damaged by the quake, and which has been operating at limited capacity since January. The plant is set to return to full operations sometime next month, Sugimori said.  JX Nippon expects its oil product exports in March to fall to 300,000 kl (1.9 million barrels) from 310,000 kl from the same year ago period. It exported 300,000 kl in February, down 110,000 kl from a year earlier. In February, the company imported 120,000 kl of kerosene, up 100,000 kl from a year ago.

The refining volumes do not include condensate but include crude processed at its 51 percent-owned venture with Petrochina, Osaka International Refining Co, an export-oriented 115,000 barrels per day (bpd) refinery.  The company, the wholly owned downstream oil subsidiary of JX Holdings Inc, operates eight refineries in Japan with total capacity of 1,625,500 bpd.

Following is a table of JX's estimates of the industry's nationwide oil product sales for this month: Demand February Oil products Yr/Yr %

 Gasoline flat

Kerosene +13 

Gas oil +2

 A fuel oil -2

C fuel oil (utilities) +160

C fuel oil (other) -6

By Reuters