Gluts and economic slowdown hamper oil industry’s recovery
Demand for various types of fuel depends on how the pandemic has affected forms of travel
07 October 2020 - 16:07
Houston — The global network of tankers, pipelines and refineries that makes useful fuels out of crude oil is built on long-standing patterns of consumption: so much petrol for the world’s drivers, a certain amount of diesel for trucks and a proportion of jet fuel for aviation.
The pandemic economy has turned that upside down, radically reshaping demand as various parts of the energy system recover at different speeds. Fear of the virus has persuaded millions of drivers to forgo mass transit and get in their cars. International travel is a vestige of a year ago and thousands of airliners lie mothballed...
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