Chevron expects poor third quarter

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SAN RAMON, Calif., Oct. 10 (UPI) -- Chevron said third-quarter earnings should be substantially lower because of refinery issues in California and the effects of Hurricane Isaac.

Chevron Corp. provided an interim earnings update, saying it expected a substantial loss for the third quarter.

The company said maintenance issues in Kazakhstan and the United Kingdom contributed to an 87,000 barrel-per-day decline in international oil equivalent production during the first two months of the third quarter. In the United States, production fell by 19,000 bpd because of the effects of Hurricane Isaac.

Energy companies in the Gulf of Mexico and along the southern U.S. coast shuttered facilities ahead of the hurricane, which struck the region in late August. About 8 percent of daily oil production and around 6 percent of natural gas production was shut-in by the storm.

Chevron said it expects production to increase in the fourth quarter because of the restoration of production in the Gulf of Mexico.

In the U.S. refinery sector, Chevron said its crude oil input volumes fell by 92,000 bpd during the first part of the third quarter in large part because of an August fire at its refinery in Richmond, Calif. That refinery is closed as the investigation into an explosion there continues.