The United States exported an average 3.5 million barrels per day of petroleum products last year, a 10 percent increase from 2012, the US Energy Information Administration said in a report Tuesday.

The agency also noted in December, US exports of petroleum products reached 4.3 million barrels per day, marking the first time those exports exceeded 4 million barrels per day in one month.

Distillate fuel exports -- which include diesel fuels and fuel oils -- reached more than 1.1 million barrels per day, an increase of 110,000 barrels per day over 2012.

Propane exports increased more than 75 percent to 300,000 barrels per day while gasoline exports increased 9 percent to 550,000 barrels per day. The US also set a monthly gasoline export record in December, when it shipped 770,000 barrels abroad daily.

Despite the export boom, the nation imported 2.1 million barrels per day of petroleum products in 2013, though that figure is on the decline, according to the EIA.

Thanks to new technologies widely applied in shale plays, US crude oil production boomed in 2013, growing 15 percent to 7.4 million barrels per day.

The Paris-based International Energy Agency predicted in November that the US may leapfrog Saudi Arabia and Russia to become the world's largest oil producer in 2015.