(EnergyAsia, January 27 2012, Wednesday) --- China’s oil demand growth slowed to 6.1% last year compared with 11.3% in 2010, said McGraw Hill’s energy media unit Platts.

Despite signs of an economic slowdown in the second half of the year, Platts said China’s apparent oil demand for 2011 reached a record 460.65 million metric tons, or 9.25 million b/d, the first time that it has breached the nine million b/d level.

According to Platts’ analysis of official data, Chinese oil consumption grew by just 0.7% year-on-year in December, the second time in 2011 that the growth rate fell below 1%.

For the quarter, oil demand was up by just 1.6%, making it the lowest of the four quarters for the year.

“But even with that relatively slow rate of growth at the end of the year, the actual demand for December was the highest daily rate the country's oil demand has ever reached,” said Calvin Lee, Platts Senior Writer for China. A nationwide scramble for diesel supply drove December’s apparent oil demand to just over 41 million mt or 9.68 million b/d.

“High crude throughput and strong net refined product imports continue to lift the apparent oil demand, outweighing the slower growth rates and the recent drop-offs in gasoline and diesel consumption,” said Mr Lee.

In December, Chinese refineries processed 39.23 million mt of crude oil, or 9.28 million b/d, with throughput hitting an all-time high for the second consecutive month. This fiure was 1.3% higher compared with a year ago, and 0.3% more than the previous record high of 9.25 million b/d achieved in November.

Platts said state-owned refiners have been ramping up production since re-starting their plants in October from weeks of scheduled maintenance turnarounds to replenish refined product inventories, particularly for diesel.

Sinopec and PetroChina have been operating their plants at capacity since October amid earlier signs of tightening supply of diesel in certain parts of the country.

To help ease fuel shortages, traders raised their refined products imports by 2% year-on-year to 4.04 million mt in December, the highest volume in nearly 30 months. December's imports, which matched the July 2009 volume, were also 20.6% more than the previous month.

Despite the domestic fuel shortages, Chinese refiners boosted oil product exports by 19.1% in December to 2.25 million mt, said Platts. At the same time, net product imports reached their highest levels in a year to 1.79 million mt, which Platts described as “surprising” considering that growth in gasoline and diesel consumption has waned in recent months according to earlier released official data.