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per day refinery and a 7.7mn tonne per year pet- rochemical facility, which includes a 1.2mn tpy naphtha cracker.
Progress
The joint venture restarted a crude distilla- tion unit (CDU) at the complex in August. Reuters quoted Petronas as saying: “We con- firm that the refinery has started feeding crude to its CDU earlier this week in efforts to restart the plant.”
Mechanical completion of the refinery was announced in November by UK-based engi- neering, procurement & construction (EPC) contractor Petrofac and trial runs at the crude distillation unit began in the first week of Janu- ary, processing Saudi crude.
Under the agreement, Aramco will supply 50% of the refinery’s crude feedstock with the option of increasing it to 70%.
The trials ended in April for safety checks after a fire broke out during trial runs of the res- idue desulphuriser. Reuters reported at the time that contractors continue to assess the extent of damage at the fire-hit ARDS.
Wider plans
Petronas said in September that drone and missile attacks on key Aramco oil production facilities would not derail the Saudi company’s investment plans.
The Malaysian major, however, has said it does not intend to participate in Aramco’s forth- coming IPO, joining the likes of Russian oil
company Lukoil and Japanese refiner JXTG to express their lack of interest in the offering.
“Petronas would like to confirm that after due consideration, the company has decided not to participate in Saudi Aramco’s initial pub- lic offering exercise,” Petronas said in an emailed statement on November 22. The company did not elaborate on its reluctance to participate in the sale of a 1.5% stake in Aramco, which could raise more than $25bn.
Aramco aims to raise global refining capacity to 8-10mn barrels per day by 2030, with expan- sion focused on major Asian consumers of the kingdom’s crude. Downstream investment pro- jects in China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Pakistan are at various stages of execution.
Most of Aramco’s current 4.9mn bpd capac- ity is produced through JVs, with around 2-3mn bpd of the total envisaged being converted to petrochemicals, to add to the 17mn tonnes per year of petrochemicals already produced.
Gross and net refining capacity stood at 4.9mn bpd and 3.1mn bpd respectively at the end of 2018. The two figures were anticipated to increase to 5.6mn bpd and 3.7mn bpd by the end of this year.
Aramco’s owned and affiliated refineries absorbed 38% of the company’s crude last year, providing a significant hedge against the oil mar- ket fluctuations of the past few years.
Crude supply agreements have been a central feature of the company’s international invest- ment projects, and the prospectus noted that Saudi oil accounted for 68% of the feedstock adsorbed by its international refineries.
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