U.S. Oil Data Infrastructure Map: Refineries, Pipelines & Export Terminals

The United States operates roughly 18.4 million barrels per calendar day of petroleum refining capacity across 131 active facilities, connected by more than 190,000 miles of crude oil and refined product pipelines to a Gulf Coast export complex that shipped 4.1 million barrels per day in 2025. For commercial real estate professionals, this infrastructure network defines the economic geography of gas station viability, truck stop site selection, industrial property demand, and energy-corridor development.

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This interactive map plots 25 major U.S. refineries (scaled by capacity), 32 crude oil pipeline systems (color-coded by basin and corridor), and 13 export and import terminals across the Gulf Coast. Click any element for detailed capacity data, operator information, and operational status. Use the layer toggles and regional zoom buttons to isolate specific infrastructure types or geographic clusters.

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U.S. Refining Capacity and the Shifting Landscape

The United States maintains the world's largest petroleum refining complex, with operable capacity of approximately 18.4 million barrels per calendar day across 131 active refineries as of early 2026. That count has declined steadily from a peak of 254 facilities in 1982, driven by consolidation, efficiency gains, and accelerating closures tied to energy transition economics. The industry lost more than 1.3 million barrels per day of capacity between 2019 and 2023 alone, with the pace of closures intensifying on the West Coast.

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The five largest U.S. refineries by calendar-day capacity are Motiva Port Arthur (641,000 b/cd), Marathon Galveston Bay (631,000 b/cd), ExxonMobil Beaumont (612,000 b/cd after a $2 billion expansion completed in March 2023), Marathon Garyville (606,000 b/cd), and ExxonMobil Baytown (564,000 b/cd). All five are located along the Texas-Louisiana Gulf Coast corridor, reflecting the region's dominance as both a refining and export center. PADD 3 (Gulf Coast) alone accounts for more than 50 percent of total U.S. refining capacity.

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Recent closures are reshaping regional fuel supply dynamics. LyondellBasell permanently closed its 264,000 b/cd Houston refinery in March 2025 after seven years on the market without a buyer, citing the site's suitability for a plastics recycling complex. Phillips 66 shut its 139,000 b/cd Wilmington, California facility in late 2025, and Valero's 145,000 b/cd Benicia, California refinery is scheduled to close in April 2026 with a $1.1 billion impairment charge. California has lost approximately 75 percent of its in-state crude processing capacity over the past two decades, leaving only five operating refineries to serve the state's CARBOB gasoline market.

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For commercial real estate professionals, refinery closures create two distinct categories of opportunity. The immediate effect is a brownfield redevelopment site, typically 200 to 1,300 acres of industrially zoned land with deepwater or rail access. The longer-term effect is a reconfiguration of regional fuel logistics, potentially increasing the strategic value of distribution terminals, truck stops, and convenience store networks that serve the recalibrated supply chain.

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Pipeline Infrastructure and the Economics of Crude Oil Movement

The U.S. crude oil pipeline network is organized around three fundamental flows: basin-to-refinery delivery, basin-to-export-terminal delivery, and cross-border import delivery. Each flow has direct implications for energy-adjacent commercial real estate, from truck stop traffic volumes along pipeline corridors to industrial land values near pipeline hubs.

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The Permian Basin in West Texas and southeastern New Mexico drives the largest single-basin pipeline buildout in U.S. history. Current takeaway capacity from the Permian exceeds 6 million barrels per day across seven major crude oil pipeline systems. The Wink-to-Webster system (ExxonMobil/Plains/MPLX) is the largest at 1.5 million b/d nameplate, followed by Enterprise's Midland-to-ECHO system (1.07 million b/d combined across three phases), Cactus II (670,000 b/d), EPIC Crude (600,000 b/d), and Gray Oak (980,000 b/d). These pipelines terminate at either the Houston Ship Channel complex or the Corpus Christi export cluster, concentrating industrial activity and associated commercial development in those corridors.

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The Bakken formation in North Dakota relies primarily on the Dakota Access Pipeline (750,000 b/d) and its downstream extension ETCOP (470,000 b/d) to move crude to Patoka, Illinois and Nederland, Texas. DAPL remains operationally secure following the Army Corps' December 2025 environmental impact statement supporting continued operations, though its construction and permitting history continues to influence pipeline regulatory risk nationally.

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The Enbridge system, the largest crude oil pipeline network in North America, delivers approximately 3.1 million barrels per day of predominantly Canadian heavy crude into the U.S. Midwest through the Mainline/Lakehead system. Enbridge's $1.4 billion MLO1 expansion, approved in November 2025, will add capacity for 2027 service. The system's primary delivery points at Superior, Wisconsin; Flanagan, Illinois; and Cushing, Oklahoma anchor regional refining clusters that support substantial commercial real estate ecosystems including workforce housing, trucking facilities, and support services.

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Cushing, Oklahoma functions as the single most important crude oil pricing and storage hub in the United States. As the delivery point for ICE WTI Crude Futures, Cushing's roughly 90 million barrels of shell capacity and its connectivity to pipelines from every major producing basin make it a nexus of pipeline, storage, and trucking infrastructure. Commercial property values in the Cushing corridor are directly correlated to crude oil inventory levels and pipeline throughput volumes.

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Export Terminals and the Gulf Coast Infrastructure Boom

The United States has undergone a structural transformation from net crude oil importer to the world's largest crude exporter, shipping approximately 4.1 million barrels per day in 2025. This shift, enabled by the 2015 lifting of the crude export ban, has driven a concentrated infrastructure buildout along the Texas Gulf Coast between Corpus Christi and the Houston Ship Channel.

The Enbridge Ingleside Energy Center near Corpus Christi is the largest U.S. crude oil export terminal, handling roughly 25 percent of all Gulf Coast crude exports with capacity exceeding 1.6 million barrels per day and 17.6 million barrels of storage. The facility loads VLCCs (Very Large Crude Carriers) and is expanding to 20.5 million barrels of storage in its Phase VII buildout. The South Texas Gateway Terminal, also at Ingleside, adds another 800,000 b/d of export capacity connected to Gray Oak, Cactus II, and EPIC pipelines.

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The Houston Ship Channel complex anchors the other major export corridor. Enterprise Products' EHT terminal leads at 2.184 million b/d nameplate capacity across 19 ship docks, while the ECHO Terminal (Enterprise), ONEOK East Houston (formerly Magellan, acquired for $18.8 billion), and Energy Transfer's HFOTCO terminal collectively provide more than 40 million barrels of storage and critical connectivity between Permian takeaway pipelines and waterborne export.

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The LOOP (Louisiana Offshore Oil Port), located 18 nautical miles off Port Fourchon, Louisiana, is the only facility in the United States capable of fully loading VLCCs at 700,000 deadweight tons. Its 72+ million barrels of salt cavern storage and three single-point mooring buoys handle both import and export operations, making it the most strategically significant deepwater crude oil facility in the country.

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Two proposed deepwater export terminals, Enterprise's SPOT (2 million b/d) and Sentinel Midstream's Texas GulfLink (1.5 million b/d), have received MARAD licenses but neither has reached final investment decision. These projects would enable full VLCC loading without lightering, potentially reducing export costs by $1 to $2 per barrel and further concentrating industrial and logistics infrastructure along the Freeport, Texas corridor.

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Why Oil Infrastructure Mapping Matters for CRE Feasibility

For CRE professionals evaluating gas stations, truck stops, convenience stores, and industrial properties, understanding the upstream and midstream infrastructure network provides critical context that generic market data cannot.

 

Gas station and convenience store feasibility studies require an understanding of regional fuel supply dynamics. A gas station in a market supplied by a single refinery faces different risk exposure than one served by a pipeline hub connected to multiple production basins. Refinery closures can temporarily spike wholesale fuel costs in affected markets, while new pipeline capacity can lower basis differentials and improve fuel economics for retailers in connected corridors.

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Truck stop site selection along major freight corridors benefits from pipeline and terminal mapping because crude oil movement drives ancillary trucking demand. Pipeline construction, refinery turnarounds, and terminal expansions generate temporary workforce surges that increase demand for lodging, food service, and fuel in corridor communities. The Permian Basin, Cushing hub, and Gulf Coast terminal clusters all exhibit this dynamic.

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Industrial property demand near pipeline hubs and terminal complexes follows infrastructure investment cycles. When new pipeline capacity enters service, demand for fabrication yards, pipe coating facilities, compression stations, and logistics staging areas increases in the surrounding commercial real estate market. The Corpus Christi and Houston Ship Channel corridors have experienced sustained industrial absorption driven by export terminal expansion since 2019.

 

For SBA and USDA lending programs, energy infrastructure context can strengthen feasibility study narratives for gas station, truck stop, and convenience store projects. Demonstrating that a proposed site sits within a well-connected fuel supply network, or that a market faces structural supply constraints due to refinery closures, provides the demand-side analysis that lenders and guarantee programs require.