Shell Changes Mind On Convent Refinery -- Louisiana -- Part To The Motiva - Saudi Aramco Story -- March 11, 2018

You may remember this story, reported some time ago:

Shell became the sole owner of the Convent refinery in May 2017 after it completed the transaction for the separation of assets, liabilities, and businesses of Motiva Enterprises LLC with Saudi Aramco. Under that deal, Aramco got the biggest refinery in the U.S., Port Arthur in Texas, while Shell received the Norco and Convent refineries in Louisiana.

Shell had planned to permanently decommission the Convent refinery:

Initial plans were to permanently decommission the gasoline unit as part of a project to integrate the Convent plant with the 225,800-bpd refinery in Norco, Louisiana, through a network of pipelines.

Shell has now changed its mind. The refinery will undergo a major overhaul this summer; gasoline production will halt for an unspecified period of time.

Shell decided not to permanently close the gasoline unit in early 2018, opting instead to overhaul it to extend its production life for at least another four to five years, Shell spokesman Ray Fisher told Reuters at that time.

Oil major Royal Dutch Shell halted gasoline production at its Convent, Louisiana, refinery between Thursday and Friday.

As of Friday morning, it was not immediately clear how long the gasoline producing unit with processing capacity of 92,000 bpd would remain offline.

The gasoline-producing unit of the 227,586-bpd Convent refinery was scheduled to undergo a major overhaul this summer, after Shell dropped its plans to decommission it.

Shell plans to shut for a planned overhaul the gasoline producing unit at Convent for some six weeks starting in June.

I don't see a cost figure but a major overhaul for extending a refinery only four to five years suggest that Shell sees quite an opportunity for selling gasoline overseas.