Oregon has reached a moment few policymakers once believed possible.

The state now operates with zero oil refineries within its borders and depends entirely on fuel delivered from outside its territory.

Gasoline diesel and jet fuel all arrive through a narrow logistical channel controlled by infrastructure and corporate decisions made far beyond state lines.

This reality became impossible to ignore when the governor of Oregon took the extraordinary step of appealing directly to the chief executive officer of Shell asking the company to return to a market it had already abandoned.

The answer was swift final and deeply unsettling for a state already living on borrowed time.

Late in 2025 Governor Tina Cotch sent a formal letter to Shell chief executive officer Wael Sawan outlining the severity of the situation.

Oregon fuel supply had become dangerously fragile.

The state possessed no refining capacity no domestic backup and no margin for error.

A recent pipeline disruption had brought the system to the brink exposing how quickly service stations could run dry and prices could spike.

Families businesses and public agencies were already feeling the strain.

The governor made clear that even a short interruption could freeze economic activity across the state.

The letter offered incentives rarely placed on the table so openly.

Long term supply contracts regulatory relief and cooperation at the state level were all proposed as ways to make a return viable.

The tone was urgent and unmistakable.

Oregon leaders were no longer debating energy policy in the abstract.

They were confronting the possibility of systemic failure.

The appeal also carried symbolic weight.

It represented a public admission that previous strategies had left the state with no internal control over one of its most critical resources.

Shell response removed any remaining ambiguity.

Speaking at the company March 2025 Capital Markets Day Wael Sawan laid out a strategy focused squarely on liquefied natural gas.

Shell aimed for annual growth of four to five percent in global LNG sales through 2030.

Capital spending would remain tightly capped between twenty and twenty two billion dollars per year.

Every investment would be measured against global returns not regional sentiment.

Refining assets would only be retained if they directly supported Shell international trading network.

The West Coast no longer fit that model.

Aging facilities regulatory complexity and high costs made re entry unattractive.

Sawan made it clear that returning would require an investment of five to ten billion dollars just to regain a foothold that Shell had exited for a fraction of that amount.

From a corporate perspective the decision was final.

Shell future lay in LNG not gasoline.

Oregon plea did not change the calculation.

That answer left Oregon in a singular position.

It became the only state in the nation with no operating oil refineries and no credible plan to build one.

Every gallon of fuel consumed within its borders is imported.

Most of it travels through the Olympic pipeline system from Washington.

The remainder arrives by barge or truck.

This arrangement means the entire economy rests on infrastructure that Oregon does not control and on suppliers with no obligation to prioritize the state in times of shortage.

On paper the numbers are stark.

One hundred percent of Oregon fuel supply is imported.

Storage facilities along the Columbia River typically hold enough gasoline and diesel for only a few weeks of normal demand.

If the pipeline slows or stops there is no alternative route capable of compensating at scale.

No refinery can ramp up production locally.

No strategic reserve exists to bridge a prolonged disruption.

At ground level the vulnerability feels immediate.

Independent gas station owners monitor their storage tanks daily calculating how many days remain if the next shipment is delayed.

Prices have already climbed above three dollars and eighty cents per gallon in many areas.

Operators know that a serious disruption could push costs far higher almost overnight.

Without a cushion every delivery matters and every missed shipment carries consequences.

Shell departure from West Coast refining began several years earlier with a decisive transaction.

In November 2021 the company sold its Anacortes refinery in Washington to Holly Frontier now known as HF Sinclair.

The sale price was three hundred fifty million dollars with total consideration exceeding six hundred million dollars once inventory was included.

The facility processed one hundred forty nine thousand barrels per day and had long supplied fuel throughout the Pacific Northwest including Oregon.

It was a cornerstone of regional supply.

When Shell exited it also shed the regulatory and operational risks associated with refining.

Those risks did not disappear.

Under new ownership the Anacortes facility continued to face scrutiny.

In August 2025 HF Sinclair was fined one point three million dollars by Washington state for hazardous waste violations including delayed cleanup of toxic sludge.

The penalty underscored the same regulatory pressures that had influenced Shell decision to leave.

With Shell gone Oregon lost not just a supplier but the implicit safety net provided by a global energy major.

The sale triggered broader reassessments across the region.

Other companies watched closely.

Some followed suit.

The first domino had fallen and the structure began to weaken.

By mid 2025 additional blows followed.

Phillips 66 announced that its Ferndale refinery in Washington would redirect most of its gasoline output to California.

The fuel was reformulated to meet Californias stricter air quality standards and no longer flowed south to Oregon.

At nearly the same time Phillips 66 confirmed plans to shut down its Los Angeles refinery removing another one hundred thirty nine thousand barrels per day from the West Coast system.

More closures loomed.

Valero set a timeline to end petroleum refining at its Benicia facility in April 2026.

Marathon shuttered multiple plants across California.

Chevron leadership publicly dismissed the idea of building new refineries calling the economics unworkable under current regulatory conditions.

Analysts agreed that no major company was preparing to step in.

The cost of re entry had climbed to five to ten billion dollars creating a barrier few if any firms were willing to cross.

As refining capacity contracted the regional supply network tightened.

Redundancy vanished.

Each remaining facility carried more weight.

Any outage anywhere reverberated everywhere.

For Oregon this meant rising exposure to events beyond its borders.

Fuel prices already strained household budgets.

At three dollars and eighty two cents per gallon many families adjusted travel and spending habits.

Businesses recalculated costs.

Trucking companies faced difficult tradeoffs.

If prices jumped to five dollars or more per gallon models suggested that freight rates would rise sharply or deliveries would be cut.

Importing fuel from Asia would add close to one dollar per gallon in shipping costs alone further inflating prices.

In November 2025 those risks became reality.

A sheen of fuel was discovered in a drainage ditch near Everett Washington.

Investigators traced the source to the Olympic pipeline the artery supplying nearly all fuel to Oregon.

Operators shut down both the sixteen inch and twenty inch lines halting deliveries south of Seattle.

Fuel terminals across Oregon felt the impact almost immediately.

Emergency crews responded quickly deploying containment measures and coordinating repairs.

The smaller line was restored after five days but the main line remained offline for longer with no clear restart date.

For Oregon the incident demonstrated how a single technical failure could threaten the entire economy.

There was no redundancy no alternate route capable of replacing the lost flow.

In rural areas the consequences were immediate and personal.

Farmers waited for diesel deliveries that did not arrive on schedule.

Harvest equipment sat idle while crops remained in the field vulnerable to weather and spoilage.

Each lost day carried financial consequences that could not be recovered later.

In these communities the pipeline shutdown was not an abstract policy issue.

It was a direct threat to livelihoods.

Oregon now exists in a state of permanent exposure.

Its fuel security depends on distant boardrooms aging infrastructure and global market dynamics beyond local control.

As West Coast refining continues to disappear energy security shifts from being a baseline assumption to a fragile privilege.

The plea to Shell revealed how narrow the margin has become.

When power no longer answers the call the cost is paid not in theory but at the pump in the field and across the economy.