Page 10 - DMEA Week 05 2023

DMEA REFINING DMEA

Karbala refinery to begin production

IRAQ THE Iraqi News Agency (INA) has announced cadres of foreign contracting companies, and
that the long-awaited Karbala refinery is to begin they are ready to start real operating activities.
commercial operations shortly, after an initial The refinery will start with a refining capacity
trial runs have been completed. of up to 60%, so that the capacity will gradually
Karbala is comprised of 35 operational and increase according to the completion and read-
service units, including four gasoline production iness of the rest of the other complementary
units, a thermal cracking unit, a poly-naphtha units.”
unit to produce octane 95 and 90 fuels, as well as Confirming this, Pak Sucho, director of a
44 storage tanks. consortium of Korean companies including
The refinery will produce LPG, gasoline, gas Hyundai, GS Engineering and Construction and
oil, fuel oil, jet fuel and asphalt to meet interna- SK Group Korea, also said: “The initial opera-
tional standards. tion of the refinery will start in mid-March, and
Plans to develop a greenfield refinery at kerosene and diesel production will start in mid-
Karbala have been on the drawing board since April, while gasoline production will begin next
2007, when Baghdad launched a downstream May, while the total operation of the refinery will
development programme comprising four new take place at the end of June. About 600 Iraqi per-
plants across the country. Of these, only Karbala sonnel were trained last year, and they will con-
has reached the construction phase following tinue to operate the operational mechanisms
the MoO’s reversion to an engineering, pro- inside the refinery this year as well, with the aim
curement and construction (EPC) contract and of increasing the experience of Iraqis working in
its award to a South Korean consortium, led by the refinery.”
Hyundai Engineering & Construction, in 2014. Speaking about the impact of the refinery, Oil
Its completion was slowed by a halt to work that Minister Hayan Abdulghani said that “the refin-
was imposed by the coronavirus (COVID-19) ery’s production will cover a large percentage of
pandemic, but in October 2021 the project had up to 75% of domestic consumption, and the
surpassed 92% completion. remaining percentage of imports will be covered
The director of the refinery, Muhammad by local production after developing a number
Fazaa, speaking to the INA, said: “Work in the of other refineries.” Early last year, then Deputy
refinery began with the operation of the first Oil Minister Hamid Younis had also said that
main refining unit, and the production of inter- the ministry was keen “to accelerate the devel-
mediate products that will be referred to comple- opment of the refinery sector in Iraq by building
mentary units with the aim of examining the rest modern refineries and introducing new units for
of the refinery’s other units.” the current refineries.” He added that the coun-
He continued: “The cadres of the Middle try would experience a “qualitative increase in
Refineries Company work side by side with the the production of oil derivatives.”™

P10 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 05 02•Febuary•2023