By Erwin Seba, Shivani Tanna, Nicole Jao and Shariq Khan
(Reuters) -Chevron’s 285,000-barrel-per-day El Segundo refinery in Southern California was mostly down on Friday after a large fire erupted in a jet fuel production unit, disrupting supply in the Golden State’s isolated energy market.
The El Segundo refinery is the second-largest refinery in California, and Chevron’s second-biggest refinery in the United States. The facility supplies a fifth of all motor vehicle fuels and 40% of the jet fuel consumed in southern California.
A fire broke out at the facility’s jet fuel production unit on Thursday evening. No injuries were reported, and all workers at the refinery were accounted for, Chevron spokesperson Allison Cook said in an email. Media reported the blaze had been contained, though it was still burning early on Friday.
It was not immediately clear what caused the explosion at the facility in the suburb of El Segundo, which supplies jet fuel for Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), located just north of the refinery.
WHAT ARE THE OPTIONS FOR CALIFORNIA’S FUEL MARKET?
“There is no known impact to LAX at this time,” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said.
The fire broke out in the refinery’s Isomax 7 unit, which converts mid-distillate fuel oil into jet fuel, two sources said.
The reformer and the fluid catalytic cracker were shut, losing over 100,000-bpd gasoline output, a trader said citing Wood Mackenzie.
On the West Coast, traders said the impact to gasoline prices was muted as of Friday morning as market participants were still assessing the extent of damage to the refinery.
U.S. gasoline futures were up around 0.3% at $1.86 per gallon as of 10:53 a.m. EDT, while crude oil prices were up around 1%.
The fire is unlikely to have a large impact on the wider oil market, two analysts told Reuters, but California gasoline prices could rise as the state’s fuel market is isolated from other U.S. refining centers in the Midwest and on the Gulf Coast.
If supply is affected, the California market could draw fuel imports from northeast Asia refiners in South Korea, Taiwan and Japan, Asian trade sources said. Northeast Asia has sent 90,000 barrels per day of jet fuel to the U.S. West Coast region so far this year versus 112,000 bpd in 2024, Kpler data showed.
“In a region that was already expected to see some tightness in supplies after a refinery shutdown this December, the fire could provide support to basis values in the area and a scramble ahead of the closure,” said StoneX analyst Alex Hodes.
Refiner Phillips 66’s is winding down operations at its 139,000-bpd Los Angeles-area refinery for permanent closure by the end of the year.
FIREBALL TURNED THE SKY ORANGE
“Chevron fire department personnel, including emergency responders from the cities of El Segundo and Manhattan Beach are actively responding to an isolated fire inside the Chevron El Segundo Refinery,” Cook, Chevron’s spokesperson, said on Friday.
“All refinery personnel and contractors have been accounted for and there are no injuries.”
Local officials said no evacuation orders were issued for nearby residents, some of whom live in apartment buildings across the street from the refinery.
Residents of Manhattan Beach, located southwest of the refinery, were told to shelter in place until 2 a.m.
Los Angeles residents posted numerous videos of the fire online, saying they were stunned by the noise of the blast. A University of California-San Diego camera captured video of the explosion shortly after 9:30 p.m. PDT (0430 GMT).
The fireball when the fire erupted turned the sky orange in the western Los Angeles area as did the refinery’s safety flare, which was set off due to the blaze.
Safety flares, which emit a tall plume of flame, are used when refineries cannot process hydrocarbons normally.
In addition to Chevron, state and federal safety agencies will investigate the fire after the blaze is extinguished, they said.
In December 2022, an isolated fire in the refinery was quickly extinguished. In the U.S. so far in 2025, there have been several refinery fire incidents.
The refinery’s total storage capacity is 12.5 million barrels in about 150 major tanks. The sources said they were not sure how much jet fuel was currently in storage.
(Reporting by Nicole Jao and Shariq Khan in New York, Erwin Seba in Houston, Shivani Tanna, Anmol Choubey, Mrinmay Dey in Bengaluru, Stephanie Kelly in London, Trixie Yap in Singapore; Editing by Susan Fenton, Clarence Fernandez and Mark Potter)
