PDVSA Restarts FCC Unit At Its El Palito Refinery In Venezuela

Published: 04-Sep-2009

Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA) has re-started the fluidized catalytic cracking unit (FCC) at its the El Palito refinery, with an estimated time of two weeks, after completing a major maintenance and process to increase its production capacity of components for gasoline. The unit is responsible for transforming the heavy gas oils into products of commercial value as fuel gas, naphtha, gasoline and olefins to the alkylation unit and oxygen plants.

The General Manager of the refinery, Jesus Sanchez, said that this phase is executed to meet the operational and security processes required for this work and confirmed to normalcy prevailing communities in central Carabobo refiner, since it has a highly able to develop this type of operational hours.

"The work done at FCC will increase its processing load from 54 to 60 thousand barrels per day, at an early stage, later to increase capacity to 70 thousand barrels per day," Sanchez said.

He stressed that the refinery units Atmospheric and Vacuum Distillation, BTX, Industrial Services (boilers, power plants and cooling system of process water) are in operation since the first week of last June, producing the necessary components for fuel for the domestic market.

Sanchez confirmed that the center made refiner equipment preventive maintenance strategy for the development of fuels and the FCC's expansion project, through the efforts of their workers, who showed restoration when running ability, preparation and dedication, with the security as the first value.

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