Iraq is forging ahead with plans to boost its refining capacity by about a third by the first quarter of 2022 to reduce dependence on imports of gasoline and gas oil, deputy oil minister told S&P Global Platts.
Iraq, which has a current refining capacity of 640,000 b/d and design capacity of 700,000 b/d, plans to add about 210,000 b/d of refining capacity by the first quarter of 2022 and boost the quality of processed products to generate more gasoline and gasoil, Hamed al-Zobai said.
“The ministry’s master-plan for refineries is to develop refineries along two parallel lines: first to increase the efficiency of current refineries to improve the quality of products and boost their quantity and the second line is to build new refineries,” al-Zobai said.
Iraq’s refineries are either old, dilapidated or were damaged in the 2013-2017 war with the Islamic State, forcing OPEC’s second-largest oil producer to import more gasoline and gas oil. However, imports of crude products have dropped this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Zobai said.
In related News, Iraq’s South Refineries Company, a subsidiary of Ministry of Oil and Japanese JGC Corporation have signed a contract for upgrading of Iraq’s Basrah Oil refinery last week.
According to the Platts, the engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning (EPCC) contract worth $3.7 Bln and its scope of work includes installation of fluid catalytic cracking unit with a 34,500-barrels-per-day (bpd) capacity; vacuum distillation unit (55,000 bpd and diesel desulfurization unit (40,000 bpd), thereby increasing production to 19,000 bpd of gasoline and 36,000 bpd of diesel fuel. The project is due for completion in 2025.