Oil Exports, Illegal for Decades, Now Fuel a Texas Port Boom<br />As the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries cuts production to prop up oil prices, American exports are beginning to elbow out Saudi crude in some markets, a development<br />that would have been inconceivable four decades ago when OPEC oil embargoes threatened to cripple the American economy.<br />We’re grabbing market share, and we’re doing our part to rectify our imbalance of trade.”<br />Suddenly buyers from all over the world are purchasing the new American supplies, from South Korea to India — even oil-rich Venezuela, which uses the light sweet crude<br />that comes out of American shale to blend with its gooey heavy crude.<br />The expansion of energy exports fits neatly with President Trump’s promise last week to usher in an age of “American energy dominance.”<br />But oil executives say the driving force for future production and exports will be the economics of global supply and demand, rather than Washington policy.<br />Crude exports from Corpus Christi have already increased from an average of 68,000 barrels a day during the first<br />half of 2016 to 384,000 barrels a day this April, according to a recent report by RBN Energy, an analysis firm.
