Only 31 per cent of Venezuela's refinery capacity remains in use

At the nation's largest complex, the 955,000-bpd Paraguana Refining Centre, four crude distillation units were operational, processing some 237,000 bpd of oil this week, with only one fluid catalytic cracker in service, one of the sources said.

At the 187,000-bpd Puerto la Cruz refinery, two crude distillation units were processing 82,000 bpd, while at the country's smallest refinery, the 146,000-bpd El Palito, one crude unit was active with some 80,000 bpd and a fluid catalytic cracker was also in service, workers from those facilities said.