What Is an IRS Terminal Control Number (TCN)?
A TCN is the identifier the IRS assigns to every approved US fuel terminal for excise tax reporting. Decode the T-DD-SS-NNNN format, understand what it does and does not tell you, and find out which terminal a given TCN identifies.
Look Up a Terminal Control Number
Enter a TCN in the format T-DD-SS-NNNN to see which fuel terminal it identifies. The IRS publishes the authoritative directory as a downloadable file — there is no official search form.
Pricing fuel rather than identifying a terminal? Diesel and gasoline price API — free tier, no credit card.
How to Read a Terminal Control Number
The IRS assigns a Terminal Control Number to each approved fuel terminal — the rack from which taxable fuel is removed. The number identifies the facility, not the company operating it, which means the TCN survives a change of ownership. Terminal operators and carriers reference it when they file under ExSTARS.
T-DD-SS-NNNN Format Breakdown
TDDSSNNNNExample: T-04-MA-1156
Resolves in the IRS terminal directory to ExxonMobil Oil Corp., 52 Beacham Street, Everett, MA 02149.
What a TCN Tells You — and What It Doesn't
1,330 Active Terminals
The IRS terminal directory dated February 28, 2026 lists 1,330 active fuel terminals across 49 states.
Identity and Location
Each entry carries a terminal name and street address. That is the whole record — there are no volumes and no throughput figures.
No Prices
A TCN is an identifier, not a price. Rack prices are set per terminal by the supplier and are not part of the IRS directory.
Facility, Not Operator
The number belongs to the terminal. When a terminal changes hands, the TCN stays the same — so a TCN is not a reliable way to identify a company.
44 Airport Facilities
The directory flags 44 terminals as secured airport facilities, typically into-plane jet fuel operations.
Check the Vintage
Several vintages of the terminal file are reachable on irs.gov at different URLs. Confirm the "ACTIVE FUEL TERMINALS @" date inside the file before relying on it.
Who Looks Up Terminal Control Numbers?
Fuel Jobbers & Distributors
Reconcile a TCN on a bill of lading against the terminal a load actually lifted from, and confirm which rack a supply contract points at.
Excise Tax & Compliance Teams
File Form 720-TO and 720-CS under ExSTARS, where every report is keyed to a TCN, and validate terminal references before submission.
Carriers & Logistics Planners
Work out which terminals are reachable for a lane, and tie lifting locations to the diesel price basis used in a fuel surcharge.
Rack Traders & Supply Analysts
Map terminal footprints by state and operator, then pair that geography with a diesel or gasoline price series to model rack economics.
A TCN Identifies the Rack. It Doesn't Price the Fuel.
If you got here because you are indexing a fuel surcharge, settling a supply contract, or modelling rack economics, the TCN only answers half your question. It tells you which terminal. It says nothing about what fuel costs there. For that you need a price series, and diesel and gasoline benchmarks are the usual basis for surcharge formulas.
Access This Data via API
A TCN tells you which terminal. Our API tells you what fuel costs. Pull diesel and gasoline prices programmatically for fuel surcharge formulas, contract settlement, and rack economics.
/v1/prices/latest?by_code=DIESEL_USDcurl -X GET "https://api.oilpriceapi.com/v1/prices/latest?by_code=DIESEL_USD"
Sample Response
{
"status": "success",
"data": {
"price": 3.412,
"formatted": "$3.412",
"currency": "USD",
"code": "DIESEL_USD",
"unit": "gallon",
"type": "spot_price",
"created_at": "2026-07-14T10:00:00.000Z"
}
}Frequently Asked Questions About Terminal Control Numbers
A Terminal Control Number (TCN) is a unique identifier the IRS assigns to each approved fuel terminal in the United States. It identifies the physical terminal facility -- the rack where taxable fuel is removed -- for federal excise tax reporting under the ExSTARS program. The format is T-DD-SS-NNNN, for example T-04-MA-1156. A TCN identifies the facility itself, not the company operating it, so the number stays with the terminal even when the terminal changes hands. As of the IRS terminal file dated February 28, 2026, there are 1,330 active fuel terminals across 49 states.
A TCN has four segments separated by hyphens: T-DD-SS-NNNN. The leading letter is the facility type -- T for terminal. The IRS uses sibling prefixes for other facility classes in the same numbering family. DD is a two-digit numeric segment: the IRS has not published a decode for it, but in the published terminal file it tracks geography loosely rather than exactly -- 64 distinct values appear across 49 states, 28 states use more than one value, and a few values span more than one state. SS is the standard two-letter USPS state abbreviation for the state the terminal sits in. NNNN is a sequential facility number. Example: T-04-MA-1156 is a terminal in Massachusetts (MA), facility number 1156.
The IRS publishes a terminal directory that maps each TCN to a terminal name and street address, and the terminal name usually carries the operating company -- for example T-04-MA-1156 resolves to ExxonMobil Oil Corp. at 52 Beacham Street, Everett, MA. Two cautions. First, the TCN identifies the facility, not the operator, so the operator can change while the TCN does not. Second, the terminal name in the directory is a facility name, not a verified corporate registration, and the directory is refreshed periodically rather than in real time. For a current, authoritative answer, check the IRS terminal directory directly.
The IRS publishes the active terminal list as a spreadsheet and PDF on its Terminal Control Number (TCN) Terminal Locations Directory page, and it is refreshed periodically. There is no official web-based search form -- the list is a downloadable file you open and search yourself. Note that several different vintages of the file are reachable on irs.gov at different URLs, so check the 'ACTIVE FUEL TERMINALS @' date inside the file before relying on it. Some state excise tax authorities also publish their own permitted-terminal lists, scoped to that state.
ExSTARS is the Excise Summary Terminal Activity Reporting System, the IRS program through which terminal operators and bulk carriers report the movement of taxable fuel into and out of approved terminals. Terminal operators file Form 720-TO and carriers file Form 720-CS. Each report is keyed to a Terminal Control Number, which is what makes the TCN the primary identifier for federal fuel excise reporting -- it is the join key between a physical rack and the tax reporting on the fuel that leaves it.
A TCN is federal and identifies a physical terminal facility for IRS excise reporting. A state fuel license or permit number is issued by a state revenue or excise authority and identifies a company authorized to distribute, blend, or sell fuel in that state. A single terminal has one TCN but may serve many differently licensed distributors, and a distributor operating in several states will hold several state license numbers while referencing the same federal TCNs. They are not interchangeable and one cannot be derived from the other.
The IRS terminal directory flags a subset of terminals as secured airport facilities -- 44 of them in the February 28, 2026 file. These are fuel terminals located inside or serving secured airport areas, such as into-plane fueling operations at major airports. They are still approved terminals with ordinary TCNs; the flag exists because physical access and jet fuel handling at these locations carry additional requirements.
No. A TCN is an identifier, not a price. The IRS terminal directory contains the terminal's identity and location only -- no pricing, no volumes, no throughput. Rack prices are set per terminal by the supplier and are not published by the IRS. If you are pricing fuel or indexing a fuel surcharge, you need a price series: benchmark diesel and gasoline prices are the usual basis for surcharge formulas, and the TCN is the wrong tool for that job.
About This Reference
The figures on this page are derived from the terminal directory published by the Internal Revenue Service, vintage February 28, 2026. OilPriceAPI is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of the IRS, and this page is not an official registry. For the authoritative and current list of approved fuel terminals, consult the IRS Terminal Control Number (TCN) Terminal Locations Directory. The observations about the numeric segment of the format are derived from that published file, not from an IRS specification; the IRS has not published a decode for that segment.