Valero Energy
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Valero Energy Corporation (NYSE : VLO) is a Fortune 500 company based in San Antonio, Texas with 21,836 employees and annual revenue of more than $90 billion. The company owns and operates 17 refineries throughout the United States, Canada and the Caribbean with a combined throughput capacity of approximately 3.3 million barrels per day, making it the largest refiner in North America. Valero is also one of the nation's largest retail operators with more than 5,000 retail and branded wholesale outlets in the United States, Canada and the Caribbean under various brand names, including Valero, Diamond Shamrock, Ultramar, Shamrock and Beacon.
Retail
Valero also retails gasoline branded as Valero, Shamrock, Diamond Shamrock, Ultramar, Beacon, and Total. While this arm of the company is the most visible to the public, it is, according to CEO Bill Klesse, "a very small part of [Valero's] operations"[1].
Valero is gradually shifting its focus from being a discount gasoline brand to becoming a premium brand. As part of that shift, Valero has begun to rebrand its Ultramar, Beacon, Total and Diamond Shamrock stations to the Valero brand. The Beacon and Shamrock brands are used by retailers as a low cost alternative to the premium Valero brand. (The Shamrock brand, in the Valero empire, is based on the former Shamrock Oil and Gas Company, which merged with Diamond Alkali in 1967 to form Diamond Shamrock.) The name Ultramar, while being eliminated in the U.S., will still be used as Valero's brand name in Canada.
History
Valero was created on January 1, 1980, as a spinoff from the Coastal States Gas Corporation. At the time, it was the largest corporate spinoff in U.S. history. Valero took over the natural gas operations of the LoVaca Gathering Company, a defunct subsidiary of Coastal States Gas. The name Valero comes from Misión San Antonio de Valero, the mission founded in 1718 from which the city of San Antonio started, which is better known worldwide as The Alamo.
The company acquired a small oil refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas in 1981, and began refining operations in 1984.
In 1997, Valero spun off its refining and retail divisions into a separate company, which kept the Valero name. At the same time, the remaining divisions, which consisted primarily of natural gas operations, were acquired by PG&E. Later that year, Valero acquired Basis Petroleum, which left it with four refineries in Texas and Louisiane.
Valero acquired a Paulsboro, New Jersey refinery in 1998. This was the company's first refinery outside of the Gulf Coast area.
In 2000, Valero purchased ExxonMobil's Benicia, California refinery and interests in 350 Exxon-branded service stations in Californie, mainly in the San Francisco Bay area. The company also began retailing gasoline under the Valero brand. In June 2001, the company acquired the Huntway Refining Company, along with two asphalt plants on the west coast.
On December 31, 2001, Valero completed its acquisition of Ultramar Diamond Shamrock. This merger left Valero with over 4,700 retail sites in the U.S., Canada, and the Caribbean. With this acquisition Valero also received ownership of Shamrock Logistics L.P., which was renamed Valero L.P. This limited partnership owns and operates a 7200 mile (11500 km) pipeline network and 57 refined product terminals in the U.S., and is publicly traded (Valero maintained a 13.6 percent indirect interest through Valero GP Holdings, LLC, also publicly traded, which in 2006 it fully divested).
Starting in 2002, Valero has been expanding its marketing to the East Coast, specifically the Northeast and Floride, using the Valero brand.
On April 25, 2005 Valero agreed to buy Premcor Inc. for $6.9 billion in cash and stock to become the largest U.S. refiner, as record prices for gasoline and other fuels boost profits.
On June 30, 2005 Valero announced it was beginning a two-year process of converting Diamond Shamrock stations to the Valero brand.
Environmental record
According to the University of Massachusetts’ Political Economy Research Institute, the Valero Energy Corporation is the 28th most toxic corporation in America, releasing 3,363,294 pounds of toxic chemicals into the air annually. [1] Valero has been sued on multiple occasions for allegedly damaging the environment, and was named as a defendant in suits in 2000 and 2001 pertaining to the contamination of groundwater.[2] In a 2005 Clean Air Act settlement with the EPA, Valero agreed to reduce its annual harmful emissions by 44,000 tons annually.[3]
