US propylene stocks fell for the fourth consecutive time to 4.085 million barrels in the week ended July 19, to the lowest level this year, according to Energy Information Administration data released Wednesday.
Non-fuel use propylene stocks fell 239,000 barrels from a week earlier, though last week's stocks were still up 1.475 million barrels from the same time a year earlier.
The week-on-week drop in US propylene stocks came alongside slightly lower refinery utilization rates, due to Hurricane Barry, which dropped 1.3% to 93.2%.
Sources said that recent turnarounds at BASF-TOTAL's cracker and in Port Arthur, Texas, and at Flint Hills Resources' propane dehydrogenation plant in Houston, along with the temporary outage at Enterprise Products Partners' PDH plant in Mont Belvieu, have put pressure on propylene supply in recent weeks and have kept supply and demand in balance.
