President to dedicate oil refinery in W. Java
President to dedicate oil refinery in W. Java
INDRAMAYU, West Java (JP): President Soeharto is scheduled on Monday to inaugurate the country's first export-oriented oil refinery (Exor I) in Balongan with a processing capacity of 125,000 barrels per day (bpd).
"The Exor I plant, whose construction was completed last August, is designed to process 100,000 bpd of heavy crude oil from the Duri field and 25,000 bpd of light crude oil from the Minas field," the plant's project manager, Soeharto, told reporters here yesterday.
Duri oil, with a high level of metal and residue content, and Minas oil are produced by PT Caltex Pacific Indonesia near Pekanbaru in Riau.
The Exor I project was constructed by the JGC Corporation of Japan at a cost of approximately US$2 billion, with financial assistance coming from Java Petroleum Investment Co. Ltd. -- a consortium grouping Mitsui Corp., Marubeni Corp., Sumitomo, C. Itoh & Co. (now Itochu) and 20 Japanese banks.
The project's construction started on Sept. 1, 1990.
The project manager said that under an agreement with its lenders, the state oil company Pertamina, the owner of the refinery, will partly repay the loans using revenues from the operation of the refinery.
In spite of its export orientation, the refinery will supply its products for local distribution. The refinery's operation, however, will enable Pertamina to increase exports of oil products from its other refineries in the country.
Soeharto, the project manager, also said that most of the plant's products are expected to meet the demands of western Java, including Jakarta, which consume some 35 percent of the country's total fuel consumption.
He said that the total fuel consumption in the country reached 47.3 million kiloliters per year. "And we predict that the fuel demand will grow by some six percent per annum," he said.
He said that the Exor I plant has a capacity to produce 136,000 tons of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) per year and 186,000 tons of propylene a year, 54,500 bpd of aviation gas, 10,437 bpd of kerosene, 24,500 bpd of automotive diesel oil (ADO), 14,890 bpd of industrial diesel oil (IDO) and 7,200 bpd of decant fuel as well as 27 metric tons of sulfur per day.
Refineries
Pertamina currently operates five refineries -- one in Pangkalan Brandan with a processing capacity of 5,000 bpd, in Dumai of Riau with 170,000 bpd, in Musi of South Sumatra with 132,500 bpd, in Cilacap of Central Java with 300,000 bpd, in Balikpapan of East Kalimantan with 253,600 bpd and in Cepu of East Java with 3,800 bpd.
In addition to the Exor I plant, Pertamina also plans to build three other export-oriented refineries, including Exor II with a processing capacity of 120,000 bpd in Irian Jaya, Exor III with 120,000 bpd in Tanjung Uban of East Kalimantan and Exor IV with 140,000 in Dumai.
The Investment Coordinating Board last year also approved commitments for the construction of four other export-oriented oil refineries by private sector companies with a combined investment of some US$7.2 billion.(fhp)