West Texas Sour Discount Widens on El Paso Outage, Rising Output

West Texas Sour oil weakened to the cheapest versus benchmark West Texas Intermediate in almost seven weeks because of decreased demand during refinery maintenance and growing production.

Work on a shut crude unit and reformer at Western Refining Inc. (WNR)’s El Paso, Texas, refinery is expected to last about two weeks or less, Gary Hanson, a company spokesman, said yesterday. Eagle Ford production of oil and condensate has grown to average between 550,000 and 600,000 barrels a day, Phani Gadde, a senior analyst with Wood Mackenzie, a research and consulting firm in Houston, said in a telephone interview.

West Texas Sour’s discount to WTI widened 20 cents to $4 a barrel at 4:05 p.m. in New York, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s the widest margin since July 6.

Light Louisiana Sweet’s premium to WTI widened $1.30 to $17.70. Heavy Louisiana Sweet rose 55 cents to $16.85 over WTI.

Poseidon’s premium increased 10 cents to $12.50. Mars Blend lost 20 cents to $12.30 a barrel over WTI. Southern Green Canyon’s premium widened by 65 cents to $11.90.

Thunder Horse, a sour crude with lower sulfur content than Mars, Poseidon and Southern Green Canyon, slipped by 30 cents to a premium of $15.

Syncrude’s premium was unchanged at $8 above WTI. Bakken oil from North Dakota was steady at a $1 discount to WTI.

Western Canada Select’s discount was unchanged at $11.

To contact the reporter on this story: Aaron Clark in New York at aclark27@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstets@bloomberg.net