In another welcome development, China is going to build refinery at Gwadar to cater for needs of the Chinese trucks that will be moving between western part of China and Gwadar port.
According to the official sources, the Chinese company will use the Russian crude oil that will be refined to produce finished petroleum products. “The products will be used in the Chinese trucks to be involved in the transportation of goods to and from Gwadar. The refinery will be not big one as it will be having the refining capacity of 45000 barrel per day.”
They said that China is working here as per its own business plan. However as far as the government of Pakistan is concerned, a plan is also being carved out according to which the country will be having the deep conversion refineries and to this effect Pak-Arab Refinery country which is mid-country refinery is going to set up a deep conversion refinery at Hub, Balochistan.
Industry sources said that Board of Directors of the PARCO has approved to start the feasibility for establishing the coastal refinery. Once the feasibility study gets completed, PARCO will take final decision. “The refinery will have the capacity to refine 250,000 to 300,000 barrels per day crude oil.”
Meanwhile, the government has decided to establish Pakistan’s first ever $5-10 billion deep conversion refinery with petro chemical complex in coastal area and to this effect, Pakistan has asked concerned authorities of Kuwait to come forward and invest in the proposed refinery.
With the establishment of the deep conversion refinery, Pakistan will get all refined petroleum products from within the country after importing only crude oil. Pakistan dependence on import of furnace oil, diesel and other petroleum products will be done way with, once the deep conversion refinery gets installed. “The proposed refinery is really a mammoth project and we are in talks with various countries for investment in the proposed refinery. We also marketed this project with authorities’ concerned in Kuwait seeking investment in the project.”
Pakistan currently imports oil products of 19.63 million tons per annum that include furnace oil of 6.6 million tons, diesel 2.6 tons, petrol 2.3 tons, jet fuel 0.13 tons, and crude oil 8million tons. The country gets crude oil of 3.85 million tons from within it.
In case the government succeeds to get established the deep conversion refinery, then Pakistan dependence on imports of furnace oil (6.6 million tons), diesel (2.6 million tons), petrol (2.3 million tons), jet fuel (0.13 million tons) will be ended as the proposed refinery will provide the required finished and refined petroleum products. PARCO being the largest refinery located in the mid country and ARL at Rawalpindi cater for demand in central and northern parts of the country. Around 60% of petroleum product demand is met through local refinery production while the remaining is imported.
Source: Pakistan Observer
