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The U.S. petrochemical industry has a crucial and enduring role to play in meeting the needs of a growing world population while simultaneously fulfilling the imperative to produce petrochemicals in a sustainable and clean manner.

“Refiners and petrochemical manufacturers are relieved that the two sides were able to come to agreement and avert what would have been a disastrous event for our economy and energy security."

American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) President and CEO Chet Thompson today sent a letter to Congressional leadership—Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy—urging their intervention to avoid a rail worker strike that could begin as soon as this Friday, September 16.

AFPM president and CEO Chet Thompson issued the following statement in response to a vote of the California Air Resources Board (CARB) approving California’s Advanced Clean Cars 2 regulation, establishing an escalating ban on the sale of gasoline and diesel-fueled cars and trucks, culminating with a 100% ban by 2035. "California’s radical ban on gasoline- and diesel-fueled cars and trucks will have devastating implications for consumers, energy security and the U.S. manufacturing economy. It is critical that President Biden and the EPA reject California’s request for a Clean Air Act waiver to proceed with this unlawful ban."

EPA’s existing Risk Management Plan (RMP) is doing what it was designed to do: drive continual safety improvements across workplaces to keep industry employees, contractors, facility neighbors and local environments safe. Any changes to a regulation as effective as the RMP need to be solidly evidence-based. Unfortunately, today’s proposal is filled with costly and misinformed changes, with little-to-no data to back them up. In fact, many of the proposed changes will adversely impact the safety and security missions of refining and petrochemical sites. AFPM looks forward to providing detailed comments on this proposal.

AFPM opposes the Inflation Reduction Act as written. We evaluated the bill against our core principles, specifically whether the legislation would support strong U.S. refining and petrochemical industries and whether it pursued emissions reductions in a market-based and cost-effective manner. Unfortunately, the IRA falls short of these goals.

AFPM President and CEO Chet Thompson issued the following statement: "AFPM applauds the United States Trade Representative (USTR) for elevating this important matter. Mexico’s policies toward American energy companies need to be addressed in the spirit of the United States-Mexico-Canada trade agreement (USMCA). American refiners have made significant investments in Mexico-based operations, jobs and infrastructure and we want our trade relationships with Mexico to remain healthy and mutually beneficial.”

The return of fuel demand to pre-pandemic levels and the slower rebound of crude oil and fuel production has created concerns about whether supplies of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel will be sufficient to meet global demand. U.S. refineries are up and running at near maximum utilization. Other major refining countries, for a variety of reasons, have not kept pace bringing their facilities back into operation or resuming sales of fuel to the market. As a result, wholesale fuel prices have increased and so have refinery “crack spreads."