Azerbaijan, Baku, May 14 / Trend A. Badalova /
Azerbaijan is in negotiations with Indonesia on a large oil refinery project, Azerbaijan's Ambassador to Indonesia Tamerlan Karayev told the Jakarta Post.
"Our state oil company, SOCAR, is in negotiations with Indonesia's OSO Group to build a large oil refinery in Batam. There is no final decision yet on the project; it is being considered," Karayev said.
In October, 2012, Reuters reported with the reference to the OSO Group CEO Mariano Asril that the Group is going to establish a joint venture with SOCAR for building the oil refinery.
"We are going to refine oil from Azerbaijan. The purpose is to trade or sell the processed oil to Indonesia or any other Asia-Pacific country," Asril said.
Karayev said that the estimated cost of the oil refinery with a planned production capacity of 600,000 barrels per day (bpd) is $ 4.8 billion. The project, if it is implemented, will be completed in 2017. Both sides will invest in construction of the oil refinery, however the most part of funding will come from Azerbaijani side. OSO Group from its part will provide them with all the facilities, the permit and the land.
According to Karayev, the project on the oil refinery in Batam is one of the several strategic projects, which Baku is interested in investing in for the further strengthening the relations between the ywo countries.
"Our Delta Group is also currently mulling a plan to build an aluminum plant in Kalimantan. We are also interested in building a fertilizer plant in Indonesia," Karayev said.
SOCAR tradesoil in various regions of the world under the banner of SOCAR Trading.
The company has made its office in Singapore fully responsible for the development of the crude oil trade in Asia, including increasing its market share at the expense of long-term contracts.