Exxon Takes Advantage Of Europe’s Diesel Boom
埃克森美孚搶搭柴油便車
By Stanley Reed

LONDON – At Dimitris Poliviou’s car repair shop in the Belsize Park neighborhood here, customers are increasingly turning up with diesel-powered vehicles.
倫敦Belsize公園附近迪米特瑞斯．波利維爾斯的修車店，開著柴油動力車上門的顧客愈來愈多。

“There are loads and loads of them,” Mr. Poliviou said.
波利維爾斯說：「大批、大批的顧客。」

The statistics bear him out. Over the last 25 years, European drivers have embraced diesel cars as they tried to save money in a region of high-priced fuel.
統計數字證實他的說法。過去25年，歐洲開車族愛上柴油動力車，因為當地燃料價格高，他們想省錢。

More than half of the new cars registered in Western Europe last year were diesel powered, compared with only about one in 10 in 1990.
去年在西歐登記的新車，逾半是柴油動力車。而在1990年時，10輛車中大約只有1輛。

Now Exxon Mobil, the biggest American oil company, is trying to take advantage of the diesel boom to bolster its struggling European refining business.
現在，美國最大的石油公司埃克森美孚，想利用這股柴油車風潮，支撐它陷入困境的歐洲煉油事業。

As fuel refining has eroded into a money-losing proposition for most European players, Exxon Mobil has planned to invest more than $1 billion in expanding diesel-fuel production at its big refinery in Antwerp, Belgium.
對大部分歐洲大公司來說，煉油已漸漸衰退為賠錢生意，埃克森美孚計畫在比利時安德衛普的大煉油廠投資逾10億美元，擴大柴油生產。

Steve Hart, Exxon Mobil’s head of refining for Europe, said last month that the company was considering diesel investments at other locations in Europe, where it has nine refineries and is second largest in the industry, after the French giant Total.
埃克森美孚的歐洲煉油部門主管哈特上個月表示，公司正考慮在歐洲其他地點投資柴油，他們在歐洲有九座煉油廠，是歐洲第二大煉油公司，僅次於法國石油巨擘道達爾公司。

From its network of refineries in northwest Europe, Mr. Hart said, Exxon Mobil will collect heavy fuels for which there is no longer much demand – like the so-called bunker used by older ships – and carry it by boat to Antwerp. There, a new refinery unit will distill the gooey substances into diesel and a similar lighter-weight fuel used by more modern ships. The company will then sell the diesel in northwestern Europe, which now imports the fuel from the United States, the Middle East and Russia.
哈特說，埃克森美孚將從公司在西北歐的煉油廠網絡，收集需求已不高的重燃油，像是老舊船使用的所謂「油箱油料」，再用船運到安德衛普。在當地，新的煉油廠將把這黏答答的油蒸餾成柴油，以及較現代船隻使用的一種類似但較輕的油。公司將在歐洲西北部銷售柴油，目前這些地區的柴油是從美國、中東和俄國進口。

Exxon Mobil is chasing a trend that was initially encouraged by lower taxation on diesel cars and fuel.
埃克森美孚在迎合一個趨勢，這趨勢起初是由較低的柴油汽車稅和燃料稅帶動的。

Carmakers in Germany and France have developed diesel versions of the Volkswagen Golf, the Audi A4, the Renault Clio and the Peugeot 308, allowing diesels to grab two-thirds of the new-car market in France, Spain and Belgium, and half of that market in Britain and Germany.
德國和法國的汽車製造商已發展出柴油版的福斯Golf、奧迪A4、雷諾Clio和標緻308，讓柴油車占據法國、西班牙和比利時新車市場的三分之二，英國和德國新車市場的一半。

“People prefer the power delivery with diesel – they feel a lot quicker,” said Luke Madden, news editor of Auto Express and Carbuyer, websites based in London.
設在倫敦的汽車雜誌網站「汽車快訊」和「汽車買家」的新聞編輯馬登說：「人們偏愛柴油車的動力傳送，感覺速度快多了。」

Mr. Madden said diesel cars achieved substantially better fuel efficiency than their gasoline-burning counterparts.
馬登說，柴油車比燃燒汽油的同型車省油得多。

Changes in fuel consumption have left European refiners with a product mix too skewed toward gasoline. But many cannot make the investments needed to adjust to the new environment.
燃料消耗的改變，使歐洲煉油公司的產品組合太偏向汽油。但許多公司無法進行為適應新環境所需的投資。

Robert Campbell at Energy Aspects, a market research firm, figures that the smaller refineries are losing $4 to $6 a barrel on the oil they process, while larger refineries may be making a razor-thin profit of $1 to $2 a barrel. Refiners, he said, have thought that “because European oil demand is going down, there is no reason to invest in refineries.”
市場研究公司Energy Aspects的坎貝爾估計，規模較小的煉油公司每煉一桶油虧損4到6美元，規模較大的公司每桶可獲利1到2美元。他說，煉油公司一直以來的想法是，「由於歐洲石油需求下降，沒有理由投資在煉油廠上。」

Some analysts question whether Exxon Mobil’s move is wise in an industry still plagued by substantial overcapacity.
部分分析師質疑，在一個仍為產能嚴重過剩所苦的產業裡，埃克森美孚的動作是否明智。

Oswald Clint of Bernstein Research in London said Exxon Mobil could improve profits more rapidly by closing poorly performing facilities in Europe.
倫敦伯恩斯坦研究公司的克林特說，埃克森美孚可以藉由關閉歐洲業績較差的一些工廠，更快的改善獲利。

Others disagree.
其他分析師看法不同。

“European refineries have to invest in a difficult environment if they want to be around for the long term,” said Paul Hodges of International eChem, a consulting firm in London. “It would be far more expensive to pretend that somehow the world will return to the market conditions of 25 years ago.”
倫敦顧問公司盈凱國際公司的霍吉斯說：「歐洲煉油廠若為長久存在打算，就必須在困難的環境中投資。假裝全球終究會回到25年前的市場環境，代價會高得多。」

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/11/business/international/exxon-mobil-to-invest-in-diesel-in-belgium.html

2014-08-12聯合報/G9版/UNITEDDAILYNEWS 田思怡譯 原文參見紐時週報七版左