Calumet San Antonio: Refinery Sold, Rebranded & Operating 2026

Calumet San Antonio ceased to exist as a brand in November 2019, when Calumet Specialty Products Partners (NASDAQ: CLMT) sold its San Antonio refinery and associated crude terminal to Starlight Relativity Acquisition Company LLC for $63 million in cash, plus working capital and inventory adjustments. The legal entity was subsequently renamed The San Antonio Refinery LLC, and the facility today is operated by Lazarus Energy Holdings LLC.

What the Calumet San Antonio Assets Were

The refinery, located in San Antonio, Texas, had a nameplate capacity of 21,000 barrels per day and was configured to process Eagle Ford crude oil and condensate — the light, tight oil produced from the prolific shale play running beneath south-central Texas. Output covered a broad product slate: LPG, naphtha, regular and premium gasoline, commercial and military jet fuel, ultra-low sulphur diesel (ULSD), and atmospheric tower bottoms. Onsite storage capacity stood at approximately 250,000 barrels.

The sale also included a separate crude oil terminal in Elmendorf, Texas, roughly 20 miles south of the refinery, with around 200,000 barrels of additional storage capacity. A dedicated pipeline connected the Elmendorf terminal to the refinery, providing the crude supply infrastructure to feed the processing unit. That pipeline arrangement had originally been underpinned by a 20-year crude supply agreement with TexStar Midstream Logistics LP, signed in 2014.

Why Calumet Sold the San Antonio Refinery

Calumet acquired the San Antonio refinery in 2013 as part of a broader push into fuels refining — a strategy the partnership later reversed as commodity price volatility pressured margins and the balance sheet. By 2019, the priority had shifted decisively toward specialty hydrocarbons, where Calumet held stronger competitive positions across its Montana and Louisiana operations.

The $63 million headline price understated the full value of the transaction. Embedded in the deal was a settlement of ongoing litigation with TexStar Midstream over the 2014 pipeline supply agreement — releasing a $38 million liability from Calumet’s balance sheet. Net of that release, the transaction delivered roughly $101 million in combined value, materially reducing leverage and removing fuels refining exposure in a single step.

The sale closed effective 1 November 2019. For context on the scale of US downstream consolidation during this period, see the top 10 downstream oil and gas companies and the relative footprint of major refining operators across North America.

Who Operates the San Antonio Refinery Today

Starlight Relativity Acquisition Company LLC acquired the assets but operational responsibility passed to Lazarus Energy Holdings LLC, a private Texas-based operator. Lazarus also operates Blue Dolphin Energy’s crude distillation facility in Nixon, Texas — a 15,000 bpd unit backed by approximately 1.2 million barrels of storage capacity, located around 70 miles southeast of San Antonio.

The renamed entity, The San Antonio Refinery LLC, continues to process Eagle Ford crude under private ownership. Calumet’s branding on the San Antonio and Elmendorf assets is fully retired. Calumet itself has since redirected capital toward its Great Falls, Montana refinery, where it is converting capacity to produce sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) under the Montana Renewables banner — a strategic pivot that defines the company’s current direction.

The San Antonio Refinery in Context

At 21,000 bpd, the San Antonio refinery was a small-scale, single-train operation. For comparison, the largest refineries in the United States run at 550,000–600,000 bpd. A breakdown of the major processing facilities that define US refining capacity is available in the top 10 refineries by capacity. The 250,000-barrel onsite storage figure also places this asset firmly in the small-to-mid tier of US crude and products storage. The broader market for US oil storage terminals is dominated by operators with multi-million barrel networks across multiple hubs.

The Elmendorf terminal, now also under Lazarus management, continues to serve as a crude receipt and pipeline injection point for the refinery. Its 200,000-barrel capacity gives the combined operation a total storage footprint of approximately 450,000 barrels across both sites — functional for a facility of this scale, but far below the threshold that would attract independent terminal operator interest or third-party throughput agreements at scale.

Calumet Specialty Products Today

Calumet (NASDAQ: CLMT) operates today as a specialty hydrocarbons and renewables business. Its core assets are the Montana Renewables platform at Great Falls and specialty products facilities in Princeton, Louisiana. The San Antonio divestiture was one of several fuels refining exits executed between 2018 and 2021 as the company restructured around higher-margin specialty chemicals, lubricants, and — latterly — renewable fuels. The Calumet corporate site confirms the current asset base and SAF development programme.

For anyone searching for the Calumet San Antonio refinery or the Elmendorf crude terminal, the short answer is: the assets remain operational under Lazarus Energy Holdings, the Calumet brand is gone, and the parent company has moved decisively into renewable aviation fuel.