The US renewable diesel import lineup for November is unusually thin as last month's equipment failure in Singapore limits loadings, while broader supply and policy uncertainty constrain both near-term liquidity and incentives to plan beyond the fourth quarter.
Just two vessels carrying renewable diesel are currently expected to reach US west coast ports this month, according to tracking data from global trade and analytics platform Kpler. Clearocean Maria reached Los Angeles with about 109,000 bl from Singapore on 2 November, per Kpler, while Leikanger is due to follow on 10 November to Long Beach, California, with an additional 345,000 bl of Singaporean renewable diesel.
The November lineup as of Thursday also reflected an atypical lack of both Newfoundland-origin cargoes and Jones Act vessels for domestic volume delivery to the west coast from the US Gulf. Altogether, present waterborne supply totals for this month would represent a 69pc drop from average west coast deliveries — both foreign and domestic — from January-September, to about 455,000 bl. Final October receipts are yet to be confirmed, but data aggregated from Kpler and early-month bills of lading suggest about 1.49mn bl across all west coast-bound vessels.
Total volumes are subject to change as more cargoes are scheduled, or if previously listed vessels are rerouted or identified as carrying a different product. But the thinned lineup is likely the first material consequence of an equipment failure that shut down production of US-spec renewable diesel at Neste's Singapore biorefinery last month.
Neste's pause in Singapore is likely to continue to stymie the flow of offshore fuel to the US west coast through the end of the year, contrary to long-held market expectation that the scheduled end of the blender's tax credit (BTC) next month would spur a flurry of imports this quarter. There remains no public timeline for a return to normal operations in Singapore, while the BTC is slated to give way to the Inflation Reduction Act's 45Z Clean Fuel Production Credit for 2025-onward, with the latter's effect on future import economics yet unknown.
In the meantime, tighter supply has spurred widespread supplier withdrawal from California's spot head of the pipeline (hop) R99 markets, and resultant stagnation in spot differentials has muddled even negotiations for remaining 2024 contracted volume. An absence of hop offers in Los Angeles and San Francisco prevailed across much of October, and scattered bids in the first week of November went entirely unanswered as Donald Trump's re-election introduced new uncertainty for federal incentive programs and, thus, US production and blender economics.
In essence, several unknowns cloud the market's present ability to develop forward supply strategy: the fate of the BTC and terms of various proposed extensions, the role the White House's changing of the guard will play in shaping remaining 45Z guidance, and the knock-on effects on both domestic production and imports from Singapore and Newfoundland — together responsible for an average 906,000 bl/month delivered to the US west coast this year so far.
