Citgo cuts production at Illinois refinery amid extreme cold - source

(Adds details, background)

Jan 30 (Reuters) - Citgo Petroleum cut production at its 167,000 barrel-per-day refinery in Lemont (Other OTC: LEMT - news) , Illinois, on Wednesday due to issues related to the extreme cold weather, a source familiar with the plant's operations said.

The Midwest region has suffered a spate of unexpected refinery outages in recent days that has pushed up cash prices for refined products.

A large swath of the United States was gripped by brutal cold and wind chills on Wednesday as record-low temperatures caused by a blast of Arctic air moved across the Midwest and into Eastern states, prompting residents to stay indoors.

Refiners were seen bidding up diesel on Wednesday, typically a sign of production issues, according to a market source.

BP PLC's Whiting, Indiana, refinery, the largest in the region, had to shut the 75,000-bpd crude unit on Saturday (Shenzhen: 002291.SZ - news) due to a small fire. The unit was still shut on Wednesday, a source said.

The company fixed steam supply problems on Tuesday and restarted a hydrotreating unit, sources familiar with plant operations said.

Phillips 66 (Hamburg: 18376318.HM - news) shut a 120,000-bpd crude unit at its Wood River, Illinois, refinery and will likely restart the unit by the weekend, a source told Reuters earlier this week.

Since mid-January, Chicago ultra-low sulfur diesel cash differentials have climbed from 33.00 cents per gallon below the NYMEX heating oil futures contract to 5.50 cents per gallon below futures. (Reporting by Jarrett Renshaw in New York; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Jeffrey Benkoe)