Even amid capacity cuts Japanese refiners still face consolidation.

摘要

In an effort to meet a new government directive requiring that Japanese refiners achieve a certain ratio (about 50%, though it varies by company) of residue cracking capacity to primary distillation capacity a number of refiners have begun to shutter some crude capacity. Local refiners are expected to take 9.5% of current CDU capacity offline ahead of March 2017 deadline lowering overall refining capacity in the country to 3.57MM b/d. This is the second time Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) has imposed a set of regulations requiring local refiners to achieve a certain ratio of residue cracking capacity to primary distillation capacity with the previous deadline seeing domestic capacity reduced by 20% to 3.95MM b/d ahead of a March 2014 deadline.