Bolstered by $35.3 billion in refined petroleum and coal product exports, the Houston metropolitan area shipped the most goods to foreign markets of any US metro region, the US Commerce Department said Tuesday. Overall, the Houston area exported $115 billion of goods in 2013, the most of any region for the second year in a row after it exported $110.3 billion in 2012. The New York metropolitan region exported $106.9 billion in goods in 2013, the second most of the 387 US metropolitan regions. Overall, $1.4 trillion in goods was exported from all US metropolitan regions last year, Commerce said. Despite the increase in refined petroleum product exports from Houston, Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker downplayed the role that oil and gas has had on US export growth, pointing out that only a third of Houston’s record export levels are oil and gas related. “What’s exciting about the whole export […]