Here’s a supertanker at anchor off the coast of Hermosa Beach. I assume it’s waiting for some kind of lovely petroleum product from one of Southern California’s many fine oil refineries, bound for one of our friends across the Pacific. Then again, maybe not. I can’t say I really know anything about the most likely use of supertankers off the coast of California.

UPDATE: I knew the locals would come through! This is from comments:

As folks have pointed out below, it’s unloading crude oil through an offshore transfer point connected to the El Segundo refinery. It’s pretty cool when you’re at Manhattan or Dockweiler beach some times and you can see a supertanker start out really low in the water and gradually rise as the tanks are emptied. IIRC, most of the crude for west coast refineries used to come from Alaska, but I’m not sure these days.

I guess I didn’t realize that California refineries received crude oil via ship. I’d have thought they used either local crude or else crude delivered via pipeline. Shows how much I know.

December 28, 2019 — Hermosa Beach, California

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate