Pak- Arab Refinery Company (PARCO) Preparing Feasibility Study Of Khalifa Coastal Oil Refinery Project 6 March 2018

Pak- Arab Refinery Company (PARCO) is in process of preparing a detailed feasibility study of Khalifa Coastal Oil Refinery project, which remained in doldrums due to paucity of funds after being approved in 2007

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 06th Mar, 2018 ) :Pak- Arab Refinery Company (PARCO) is in process of preparing a detailed feasibility study of Khalifa Coastal Oil Refinery project, which remained in doldrums due to paucity of funds after being approved in 2007.

"The company is working on feasibility study of the project, to be executed at an estimated cost of $ 4.5 billion," sources told APP while sharing official data. . They said the company was implementing the project at Khalifa Point, near Hub, Balochistan, which would be a state of the art refinery having capacity of 250,000 to 300,000 barrels per day (11-14 million tons per annum).

The sources hoped that practical work on the multi-billion Dollar project would start soon, which was abandoned during previous tenure of Pakistan Peoples Party in Federal government. Annual consumption of petroleum products in the country, the sources said, was around 24 million tons, out of which only 15 percent was met through indigenous crude oil, while 85 percent requirements were met through imports in the shape of crude oil and refined petroleum products.

The indigenous and imported crude is refined by six major and two small refineries. Highlighting some achievements of the current government in oil sector, they said, Byco Oil Pakistan Limited (Byco) has installed an Oil Refinery at Hub, Balochistan at a cost of$ 400 million in 2015, having refining capacity of 120,000 barrel per day (bpd), equivalent to 5 million tons per annum.

The Byco has also installed Single Buoy Mooring (SBM) facilities for transportation of crude oil from ships to the storages tanks, they sources added. Total PARCO Pakistan Limited acquired Chevron Pakistan Limited and with 765 petrol pumps it has become almost the size of Shell Pakistan.

They said the government reopened six abandoned oil depots by increasing their storage capacity after seeing reduction in natural gas availability and increasing demand of motor spirit oil that surged by 25 percent in last five years.

At present, the sources said, around 22 depots were included into lnland Freight Equalization Margin (IFEM) pool, out of total 29, operating across the country, where prices of petroleum products were uniformed.

They said the government's decision to reduce the number of IFEM depots from 29, was meant to bring the efficiency in IFEM mechanism and eradicate dumping. lsomerization Project of Pakistan Refinery Limited (PRL) valuing $50 million has been commissioned in July, 2015 after which production of Motor Gasoline has been doubled i.e.

24,000 metric tons per month. Crude Oil/ Condensate decanting facility at PARCO (MICR) has been commissioned in December 30, 2015, being the essential need of PARCO to receive Northern region crude oil/condensate in the country.

The Attock Refinery Limited (ARL) has started producing Euro-ll (0.05% Sulphur) High Speed Diesel from July 2016, besides it installed isomerization plant and enhanced the production of Motor Gasoline.

ln order to promote fuel efficiency, the sources said, the government introduced marketing of 92 RON Premier Motor Gasoline replacing the existing 87 RON PMG under the regulated environment effective from November, 2016.

In addition, the marketing of 95/97 PMG has also been allowed under deregulated environment. From January 2017, they said, entire imports of HSD were as per Euro-ll specification (0.05% sulphur content.