BAKU, Azerbaijan, Apr.6
By Leman Zeynalova - Trend:
SOCAR Turkey is following developments to resume jet fuel output, Head of the SOCAR Turkey Refinery and Petrochemicals Business Unit and General Manager of Petkim Anar Mammadov told Trend.
“Some refineries throughout the world had to suspend their operation, while some had to reduce their capacity due to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Nevertheless, STAR Refinery, which was commissioned in October 2018 and operates in synergy with Petkim petrochemical complex, reached records in production. Alongside with supplying naphtha to Petkim, STAR Refinery made a significant contribution to reducing Turkey’s current account deficit with sales in domestic market,” he said.
Mammadov noted that STAR Refinery’s advanced technology, its integration with Petkim, its model suitable for digital transformation, effective production planning and optimization processes enabled it to successfully cope with challenges in this period.
“We were able to rapidly convert our jet fuel production capacity into diesel and continue uninterrupted production. Starting from the second half of 2020, we have increased our annual crude oil processing volume to 10.5 million tons, thereby exceeding our design capacity,” he added.
He went on to add that the recovery observed in the markets in the last quarter of 2020 is in the spotlight in Q1 2021 with the start of vaccination process.
“STAR Refinery, one of the biggest suppliers of the domestic market, continues to operate at high capacity in the first quarter of the year. When the jet fuel demand fell due to restrictions on both national and international flights, we quickly converted our 1.6 million tons of jet fuel capacity to diesel. We are following the current developments in order to turn this capacity back to jet fuel with the start of a serious developments in flights,” said Mammadov.
Star Refinery, with investment value of $6.3 billion came on stream in October 2018. Around $3.3 billion of the project’s cost was covered by loans. The total investment in Star Refinery is expected to stand at $7 billion.
The annual processing capacity of Star Refinery stood at 10 million tons. It meets around 25 percent of Turkey’s refined oil products. The refinery is able to process 214,000 barrels of crude oil per day.
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