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(Reuters) PBF Energy Inc, one of the largest independent oil refiners in the United States, spent heavily in recent years to build the rail terminals at its Delaware City complex that it needed to take delivery of large loads of crude coming from North Dakota’s Bakken oil fields.
But now it is considering eliminating those deliveries altogether, and replacing them with foreign crude imports, according to two sources familiar with the situation. It has even closed its small Oklahoma City office that was only opened in 2013 and had served as a hub for the company’s trading in North Dakota’s oil, the sources said.
The sudden lack of interest in Bakken crude by PBF, which is run by Thomas O’Malley, one of the biggest names in the U.S. oil refining industry, reflects a dramatic recent change in the way East Coast refineries are sourcing the crude that they turn into everything from gasoline to heating oil and jet fuel.
The boom in the output of oil from North Dakota’s shale has ebbed as producers have begun to cut back in the face of the plunge in prices by nearly 60 percent since the summer of 2014.
North Dakota’s Bakken production peaked at 1.153 million barrels per day in June, and had fallen to 1.13 million barrels per day by August, according to state data.
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