Infrastructure and Systems
Refineries, pipelines, terminals, and gas stations. How fuel gets from the ground to your tank, and where the chain breaks.
The System
The United States consumes approximately 20 million barrels of oil per day. Moving that volume from refineries to consumers requires an infrastructure of 2.5 million miles of pipeline, hundreds of petroleum terminals, and an enormous fleet of tanker trucks making the final deliveries to retail stations. The system operates continuously, with minimal storage at most points, making it efficient under normal conditions and vulnerable to disruptions that break the flow.
Petroleum products travel from refineries along major pipelines to regional storage terminals, where they are blended with additives (including ethanol), loaded into tanker trucks, and delivered to retail stations. The Colonial Pipeline, which runs 5,500 miles from Houston to New York Harbor, carries roughly 45 percent of the fuel consumed on the East Coast. Its temporary shutdown in May 2021 following a ransomware attack caused fuel shortages across multiple states within days, demonstrating how dependent a large region can be on a single piece of infrastructure.
Natural gas follows a parallel but distinct system. Production fields connect via gathering lines to processing plants that remove impurities, then to interstate transmission pipelines, then to local distribution companies (LDCs) that deliver to homes and businesses. Unlike petroleum products, natural gas cannot be easily stockpiled at the retail level. Households and businesses that depend on natural gas for heating and cooking have no backup when pipeline supply is interrupted.
How It Works: End to End
Extraction and refining
Crude oil is extracted from wells and transported to refineries, which produce gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, heating oil, and other products.
Pipeline transmission
Refined products move through major pipelines to regional distribution points. The Colonial Pipeline is the largest refined product pipeline in the U.S.
Petroleum terminals
Regional storage facilities where products are blended with additives, stored, and loaded into tanker trucks.
Tanker truck delivery
Trucks deliver fuel from terminals to retail stations, typically on 2 to 3 day delivery cycles.
Retail station storage
Underground tanks at gas stations hold several days of inventory, depending on volume. High-demand stations can run out in hours during a disruption.
Natural gas: parallel system
Transmission pipelines deliver natural gas directly to local distribution companies, which deliver to homes and businesses via underground distribution lines.
Vulnerabilities
Regional fuel supply depends on a small number of pipelines and refineries, creating concentration risk that becomes visible during disruptions. The Gulf Coast accounts for roughly 45 percent of U.S. refining capacity. When hurricanes affect the Gulf Coast, as Katrina, Rita, and Harvey all did, a significant share of national refining capacity is disrupted simultaneously. The Northeast's dependence on the Colonial Pipeline was made clear in 2021 when a ransomware attack caused shortages across multiple states within days.
Retail station inventory is the thinnest part of the system. A high-volume station may turn over its entire underground tank inventory in a single busy day. During the Colonial Pipeline disruption, panic buying, not actual shortage, exhausted station inventory in many areas. This pattern repeats in every regional fuel disruption: the physical shortage is real but modest; the behavioral response to the shortage amplifies it significantly.
Pipeline concentration
The Colonial Pipeline carries 45% of East Coast fuel. A 6-day outage in 2021 caused shortages across multiple states.
Refinery geography
45% of U.S. refining capacity is on the Gulf Coast, in the path of Atlantic hurricanes.
No retail inventory buffer
Gas stations carry 2 to 5 days of inventory. Panic buying can exhaust this in hours.
Natural gas storage limits
Homes and businesses cannot stockpile natural gas. Pipeline interruption means immediate loss of supply.
20M
Barrels of oil consumed in the U.S. per day
EIA
2.5M mi
Miles of petroleum and natural gas pipeline in the U.S.
DOT PHMSA
45%
Share of East Coast fuel carried by the Colonial Pipeline
Colonial Pipeline / EIA
6 days
Duration of the 2021 Colonial Pipeline shutdown following ransomware attack
DOE incident reports
What This Means for You
Fuel supply disruptions are the most common infrastructure emergency most households face. Keeping your vehicle's fuel tank above half, having a small supply of properly stored fuel for generators, and knowing your area's fuel distribution geography are the practical steps. The transportation preparedness guide covers vehicle readiness, fuel storage safety, and evacuation fuel planning.
See the preparedness guide