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The Business Enterprise-Bus508

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Production and Operations Management

The Business Enterprise-BUS508

Dr. John Woodard

Tammy English

Strayer University

August 11, 2011

Marathon is an integrated international energy company engaged in exploration and production; oil sand mining; integrated gas; and refining, marketing, and transportation operation. Marathon is among the top five crude oil refineries in the United States, so surely there is a way to reduce the time involved in the production process. The major crude oil refineries in the United States are located in the hurricane region of the gulf coast. One possible option that Marathon could take to reduce the time involved in the production process would be to create new petroleum refineries in different regions allowing operators to shift process and production responsibilities in the event of a natural disaster or scheduled outage.
There may be one feasible alternative as to why Marathon would want to reduce the time in the production of the petroleum products. In order to produce gasoline, the crude oil must go through the refinery and transportation processes. In those processes sometime could be saved either by increasing the speed of separation in the crude oil refinery process or by increasing the speed in the transportation process. Crude Oil, like any other product, is traded on the world market. In recent times, crude oil prices have been rocketing, driven by rising global demand and political instability in several oil producing countries. Crude oil prices are important in determining gasoline prices because crude is the primary raw material used to produce gasoline and other petroleum products. In some cases, the price of crude oil may account for up to half the price of a gallon of gasoline.
The Capline Pipeline transports crude oil at an average speed of four miles per hour or just about a walking

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