SINGAPORE: State-owned Taiwanese refiner CPC Corp is expected to start operations at four new units in southern Taiwan by the end of this year, lifting the refinery's crude processing capacity by 17 percent, the company said on Tuesday.
The company is building a 150,000 barrel per day (bpd) crude distillation unit (CDU) at its Talin refinery which will replace an older 100,000-bpd CDU at the same site, spokesman Ray-Chung Chang told Reuters.
This will bring the refinery's crude processing capacity to 350,000 bpd, up from 300,000 bpd currently, he said. The company also operates a 200,000-bpd refinery in Taoyuan.
CPC mothballed its 220,000-bpd refinery in Kaohsiung in November after local residents campaigned for its closure on environmental grounds.
At the Talin complex, CPC is also building two hydrotreaters with a total capacity of 70,000 bpd, and a 50,000-bpd condensate splitter, Chang said. "The units will be started up one after another by the end of this year," he said.
CPC will become a condensate importer and the new units will increase its naphtha, low-sulphur diesel and jet fuel production.
"We will meet domestic demand first," Chang said, when asked if CPC would become a naphtha exporter.
CPC operates two naphtha crackers with a total capacity of more than 1 million tonnes per year (tpy) which require more than 280,000 tonnes of naphtha a month if they are at high rates. Part of this requirement is met through imports.
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