At a meeting with the Supervision Delegation of the National Assembly’s Committee on Science, Technology and Environment on the afternoon of 24/8, the Management Board of the Dung Quat Refinery Project (Quang Ngai) announced that the refinery had temporarily ceased operations from 18/8 due to valve equipment failure at the catalyst regenerator unit of the Residue Fluid Catalytic Cracking (RFCC) workshop.
Previously, during the construction phase, contractors had identified more than 172,000 technical issues at the Dung Quat Refinery, and several technical incidents also arose during trial runs. As a result, on 25/8, the refinery could not yet operate at 100% capacity as initially planned.
Currently, the Technip consortium is working with Binh Son Refining and Petrochemical Company to address a number of technical issues to ensure full-capacity operation in time for acceptance and handover of the refinery on 25/10.
According to the report from the Management Board of the Dung Quat Refinery Project, since the end of February until now, the refinery has produced four types of qualified products for domestic consumption. These include nearly 81,000 tons of A92 gasoline, more than 83,000 tons of diesel, nearly 24,000 tons of kerosene, and 31,362 tons of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). The Government has also recently approved an adjusted total investment capital for the Dung Quat Refinery Project to more than USD 3 billion (an increase of about USD 553 million compared with the initial estimate).
To date, the Dung Quat Refinery has received 11 shipments of crude oil from the Bach Ho field (Vung Tau), equivalent to about 880,000 tons of crude oil for processing. However, as output from the Bach Ho field continues to decline, the Technip consortium is adjusting the refinery’s technical parameters to accommodate blending crude oil from Bach Ho with oil from the Rong and Ca Ngu Vang fields, ensuring a stable feedstock supply for the refinery’s operations.
At the working session with the Management Board of the Dung Quat Refinery, Mr. Dang Vu Minh, Standing Member of the National Assembly – Chairman of the National Assembly’s Committee on Science, Technology and Environment, and Head of the Supervision Delegation emphasized: “The contractors must quickly identify the cause, promptly resolve the incident, and ensure the refinery operates at 100% capacity according to the planned schedule.”
According to Mr. Minh, the Dung Quat Refinery Project is a national key oil and gas project, thus requiring special attention to security, safety, and environmental protection during production. He also highlighted the importance of improving the quality of life for people who had given up land for the refinery project and relocated to resettlement areas within the Dung Quat Economic Zone and neighboring areas.
The National Assembly’s Supervision Delegation also proposed establishing a documentation archive center throughout the construction process of the Dung Quat Refinery to serve as a basis for repairs and as a reference for future refinery construction projects in Vietnam.
The Dung Quat Refinery officially produced the first batch of made-in-Vietnam petroleum products on 22/2.
Tri Nguyen
Source: vnexpress.net, 28/8/2009
