Azerbaijan, Baku /corr. Trend V.Sharifov / A high-ranking representative of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) said that by 2010 Azerbaijan will begin producing car petrol through Euro-5 standards in the oil refineries (OR). The SOCAR owns two OR with a total capacity of more than 20mln tons per year.
Euro-5 is an ecological standard regulating maintenance of the used substances in exhaust. The standard will be obligatory for all new trucks to be sold in the European Union from October 2008. Applying this standard to the passenger cars will be possible from 2009.
The quality of the car petrol of Azerbaijan may be raised by the US UOP company, which installs new refinery equipment in the Oil Refinery named after Heydar Aliyev (former 'Azerneftyanajag'). Installing the Oxypro equipment will provide an opportunity to increase the production of the petrol up to 1.2mln tons per year. The Alkylene equipment will produce alkylate for the car petrol in volume of nearly 300.000 tons per year and Oxypro 130.000 tons of high-antiknock petrol per year. The project is estimated at $60-90mln.
"We have already completed part of the search work on the project. Currently we are implementing detailed engineering for the installation of new equipment in the OR," SOCAR representative said.
SOCAR representative does not doubt that by 2010 the Azerbaijani petrol with Euro-5 standards will be in great demand not only in the EU countries, but also in the local market, including Georgia and Iran. Currently the petrol is sold exactly in these markets. Producing petrol with Euro-5 standards will provide an opportunity to SOCAR to expand the market of the product in the EU countries.
The SOCAR plans to expand not only the market of petrol, but also geography of its production. The SOCAR intends to construct a new OR in the Turkish Port of Ceyhan. The Company has already submitted an application for the construction of the OR and expects the decision of the Turkish Government. SOCAR plans to produce petrol through Euro-5 standards in the OR in Turkey.
"We suppose that the key market of the petrol produced in OR in Ceyhan will be Turkey," SOCAR representative said.