23 February 2011

Oil is far and away the largest U.S. import but Moammar Gadhafi's Libya plays a relatively small role in those imports, according to WorldCity analysis of annual U.S. Census data released earlier this month.

Libya accounted for 0.63 percent of the $260.1 billion in oil imports in 2010, the lowest percentage since the African nation began importing oil into the United States again in 2004. The $1.6 billion imported from Libya made it the United States' No. 20-ranked import partner for oil. It ranked No. 19 the previous year.

While Houston and New Orleans are the nation's top two ports of entry for foreign oil, Houston and Philadelphia dominate U.S. oil imports from Libya.

While Libya is not a big player in U.S. oil imports, it is nevetheless more important than either Egypt, where long-time leader Hosni Mubarek was forced from office by protests, or Tunisia, where the Middle Eastern protest movement was born. Egypt ranked as the United States' 31st most important trade partner for oil and Tunisia as No. 40.

The United States' top five oil importing nations are Canada, at $260.1 billion, Saudi Arabia ($30 billion), Mexico ($29.4 billion), Venezuela ($29.1 billion) and Nigeria ($29.1 billion).They accounted for 64.2 percent of all oil imports into the United States in 2010.

The $260.1 billion the United States imported in 2010 is the second-highest total on record, falling short only of the $353.5 billion imported in 2008, when oil prices spiked in the summer.

The 2010 total remains 26.4 percent below the 2008 total but increased 3.7 percent over the 2009 total. The value of oil imported into the United States nevertheless grew rapidly over the course of the last decade. The 2010 total of $260.1 billion easily drawfs the 2003 total of $101.8 billion, when the total first topped $100 billion. In 1999, the total was $50.9 billion.

 

 

 

 

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