rongsheng refinery china free sample

China"s private refiner Zhejiang Petroleum & Chemical is set to start trial runs at its second 200,000 b/d crude distillation unit at the 400,000 b/d phase 2 refinery by the end of March, a source with close knowledge about the matter told S&P Global Platts March 9.

ZPC cracked 23 million mt of crude in 2020, according the the source. Platts data showed that the utilization rate of its phase 1 refinery hit as high as 130% in a few months last year.

Started construction in the second half of 2019, units of the Yuan 82.9 billion ($12.74 billion) phase 2 refinery almost mirror those in phase 1, which has two CDUs of 200,000 b/d each. But phase 1 has one 1.4 million mt/year ethylene unit while phase 2 plans to double the capacity with two ethylene units.

With the entire phase 2 project online, ZPC expects to lift its combined petrochemicals product yield to 71% from 65% for the phase 1 refinery, according to the source.

ZPC has the widest flexibility on both crude slate and product slate as the newest integrated complex in China, which enables it to adjust production plans promptly in line with market changes, he said.

Zhejiang Petroleum, a joint venture between ZPC"s parent company Rongsheng Petrochemical and Zhejiang Energy Group, planned to build 700 gas stations in Zhejiang province by end-2022 as domestic retail outlets of ZPC.

Established in 2015, ZPC is a JV between textile companies Rongsheng Petrochemical, which owns 51%, Tongkun Group, at 20%, as well as chemicals company Juhua Group, also 20%. The rest 9% stake was reported to have transferred to Saudi Aramco from the Zhejiang provincial government. But there has been no update since the agreement was signed in October 2018.

rongsheng refinery china free sample

Podcast: China"s petrochemical refiners are making their presence felt way beyond the country"s borders. How will this impact global supply, demand, and trade balances? Will global operating rates be reduced?

Textile giants Rongsheng and Hengli have shaken up China"s cozy, state-dominated oil market this year with the addition of close to 1mn b/d of new crude distillation capacity and vast, integrated downstream complexes. Petrochemical products, rather than conventional road fuels, are the driving force for this new breed of private sector refiner. And more are on their way.

Tom: Hello, and thank you very much for joining us for the latest in our series of podcasts, "China Connection." I"m Tom Reed, VP for China Crude and Products. I head our oil analysis and pricing for the Chinese market.

Tom: And today we are discussing the advent of petrochemical refineries in China, refineries that have been built to produce mainly petrochemical feedstocks. Just a bit of background here, these two big new private sector firms, Rongsheng and Hengli, have each opened massive, shiny new 400,000 b/d refineries in China this year. Hengli at Changxing in Northeast Dalian and Rongsheng at Zhoushan in Zhejiang Province on the East coast. For those unfamiliar with Chinese geography, Dalian is up by China"s land border with North Korea and Zhoushan is an island across the Hangzhou Bay from Shanghai. And the opening of these two massive new refineries by chemical companies is shaking up China"s downstream market. But China is a net exporter of the core refinery products, gasoline, diesel, and jet. So, building refineries doesn"t sound like a purely commercial decision. Is it political? What"s behind it? How will it affect the makeup of China"s petrochemical product imports?

Chuck: And clearly, the driver here for Rongsheng and Hengli, who as Tom mentioned, are chemical companies, they are the world"s largest producers of purified terephthalic acid, known as PTA, which is the main precursor to make polyester, polyester for clothing and PET bottles. And each of them were importing massive amounts of paraxylene, paraxylene being the main raw material to make PTA. And paraxylene comes from the refining of oil. And really the alternate value for paraxylene or its precursors would be to blend into gasoline to increase octane. So, when looking to take a step upstream in terms of reverse or vertical integration, they"ve quickly found themselves not just becoming paraxylene producers, but in fact becoming refiners of crude to begin with, which of course, is quite complex and it involves all kinds of co-products and byproducts. And as many know, the refining of oil, the primary driver there, as Tom has mentioned, is to produce motor fuels. So, we"re reversing this where the petrochemicals become the strategic product and we look to optimize or maybe even limit the amount of motor fuels produced.

So, just as an order of magnitude and to show the numbers aren"t so massive in terms of global PX demand or paraxylene demand. Back in 2010, the global demand for PX was around 30 million tons for the year, of which Chinese demand was about a third or 9.8 million tons. And then last year in 2018, global demand had increased to 43.5 million tons, but of which now China was consuming 25 million of those 43.5 million tons. So, you can see that China is consuming more than half of the global PX demand and yet their production or their capacity to produce PX was far below that. And as a result, China imported last year nearly 16 million tons of PX or about a third of the global production was actually shipped into China by producers who are in the Middle East or the primary sources are from Northeast Asia, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and then Southeast Asia as well.

Chuck: And margins, of course, as well because no one wants to shut down their unit just to accommodate the new Chinese production. And what remains to be seen is global operating rates for these PX units will be reduced to maybe unsustainable levels. And as margins come down, they"ll be down for everyone, but the most efficient suppliers or producers will be the ones that survive. And in the case of Hengli and Rongsheng, low feedstock costs, if you"re driving down the cost of paraxylene, you take the benefit on the polyester side because now you have very competitive or very low-priced feedstock.

Tom: That"s a really interesting point actually. Looking at it from a refining economics point of view, if you were trying to diversify your revenue stream, for example, you probably wouldn"t want to increase your gasoline production. And gasoline margins in Europe are barely breaking even, they"re about $4 a barrel. In China, gasoline crack spreads are actually negative. So, fine, they"re self-sufficient in the paraxylene they need for weaving, but are they just... the refiners themselves, Hengli and Changxing, are they now just soaking up losses from the sales of their transport fuels? I think they may be initially, but they"re not just giving their gasoline away, obviously, these refineries were conceived as viable commercial concerns. Hengli anticipates profits, I think, of around 12 billion Yuan per year from its Changxing refinery giving a payback period on that investment of around five years. And each company, interestingly enough, has a distinct marketing strategy for their transport fuel.

Rongsheng is trying to build itself into a retail brand around Shanghai and the Zhejiang area. And Hengli is trying to muscle into the wholesale market on a national level, so it"s gonna be selling products across China. And in that respect, as we were discussing earlier, in fact, Rongsheng appears to have an advantage because where it"s located on the East Coast of China, that region is net short still of transport fuels, but Hengli in the Northeast, that"s a very competitive refining environment. It"s a latecomer to an already pretty saturated market: PetroChina, a state-owned oil giant, is a huge refiner up in Northeast China with its own oil fields, so a ready-made source of low-cost crude. And it"s also very close to the independent sector refining hub in Shandong Province, which is the largest concentration of refineries in China. So, I think there are definite challenges for them on the road fuel front, even if it sounds like they"re going to be pretty competitively placed further downstream in the paraxylene market.

Chuck: Well, and beyond paraxylene, they are looking at...to maximize paraxylene, not to get too technical, but you wanna split the naphtha into two different qualities and the high N+A, or the heavier naphtha is what yields the most paraxylene per ton of feed. But then you"re left with a lighter paraffinic naphtha, which is not particularly good to blend into gasoline. And so, therefore, both are building ethylene steam crackers using that naphtha and then taking the ethylene down into polyethylene plastics. Not strategic markets for these two players necessarily, but China also has massive deficits in terms of meeting its domestic polyethylene demand. China is the largest importer of polyethylene and polypropylene. So, these projects will help offset some of that as well. But I"m concerned, you mentioned about the road fuels and if they are making retail gasoline, one needs octane, and it"s precisely the precursors to the paraxylene that are needed, you have to buy those away from the chemical sector in order to blend up to the appropriate octane level. Is there a chance that they might be able to export fuels products or is that left to maybe some of the other established refining players in China?

Tom: Well, that"s one of the peculiarities of the Chinese market. As private sector companies, neither Rongsheng nor Hengli are allowed currently to export transport fuels. That"s a legacy concern of the Chinese government to ensure energy self-sufficiency downstream to make sure there"s adequate supply on the domestic market of those fuels. So, that is a real impediment for them. And when they ramp up production of gasoline, diesel, and jet, they are driving down domestic prices and they are essentially forcing product into the seaborne market produced by other refineries. So, in that respect, the emergence of Hengli in Northeast China on PetroChina"s doorstep has created a huge new sense of competition for PetroChina in particular. And I think certainly when you look at their recent financial data, it"s quite clear that they are struggling to adapt to the new environment in which it"s essentially export or die, because these new, massive refineries are crushing margins inside China.

I think globally it"s increasingly a competitive environment for road fuels. China is already a net exporter of over 1mn b/d combined of gasoline, diesel, and jet. It"s the fastest-growing exporter of those fuels in the world. But over-supply is also percolating through into the seaborne market: Indian diesel exports are rising; everyone is trying to desperately seek out net short regions and they"re having to ship product further and further overseas. And we"re seeing a situation emerge now in China where these refineries are importing crude perhaps from Latin America and they"re exporting finished products to those same markets from which they took the crude. It"s a tricky arbitrage, one would imagine.

Chuck: And going back specifically to the Hengli and Rongsheng projects, it"s interesting to note, again, going to an order of magnitude or perspective, Hengli is producing or has capacity to produce 4.5 million tons of paraxylene. And in phase one, Rongsheng will have capacity to produce 4 million tons. And I know those are just large numbers, but again, bear in mind that last year, global demand was 43.5 million. So, effectively, these two plants, they could account for 20% of global demand. Just these two projects themselves to give you an idea of just how massive they are and how impactful they can be. Impactful or disruptive, it remains to be seen.

Tom: A sign it doesn"t do things by halves. Although that said, one of the interesting things they have done is essentially halved their transport fuel yields. So, where in a conventional refinery, your combined output of gasoline, diesel, and jet, those core products, might be in the region of 80%, when you look at these new refineries, they"ve really cut that back down to 40% or 50%. And there are new petrochemical refineries springing up, and it"ll be very interesting to see how disruptive those are to the petrochemical market. But in the conventional refining market, they are, I think under pressure to do even more to reduce their exposure to already weakened gasoline and diesel markets. I mean, Shenghong — this new textile company who"s starting up another massive new conventional refinery designed to produce petrochemical products in 2021, I think — they"ve managed to reduce that combined yield to around 30%. They"ve reduced that from an original blueprint.

Chuck: It"s remarkable, but just a note of caution, there have been other petrochemical and refinery projects built recently in Saudi Arabia and in Malaysia, in particular, with established engineering and established chemical and refining companies. And they"ve had trouble meeting the targeted dates for startup and it"s one thing to be mechanically complete, it"s another thing to be operationally complete. But both Hengli and Rongsheng have amazed me at how fast they were able to complete these projects. And by all reports so far, they are producing very, very effectively, but it does remain to be seen why these particular projects are able to run whereas the Aramco projects in Malaysia and in Rabigh in Saudi Arabia have had much greater problems.

Tom: It sounds like in terms of their paraxylene production, they are going to be among the most competitive in the world. They have these strategies to cope with oversupplied markets and refined fuels, but there is certainly an element of political support which has enabled them to get ahead of the pack, I guess. And suddenly in China, Prime Minister Li Keqiang visited the Hengli plant shortly after it came on stream in July, and Zhejiang, the local government there is a staunch backer of Rongsheng"s project. And Zhoushan is the site of a national government initiative creating oil trading and logistics hub. Beijing wants Zhoushan to overtake Singapore as a bunkering location and it"s one of the INE crude futures exchanges, registered storage location. So, both of these locations in China do enjoy a lot of political support, and there are benefits to that which I think do allow them to whittle down the lead times for these mega projects.

So, thank you for joining us today, and it"ll be interesting to follow all of these developments because there still are so many moving parts. And you can follow this on the petroleum side with China Petroleum, the publication in which Tom edits out of London or some of our petrochemical reports. We do daily assessments on the paraxylene markets as well as monthly outlooks, which include global price forecasts. And we have databases which show supply, demand, and trade flows, etc. And then also please tune in for future episodes of the "China Connection." And we thank you for your time and attention.

rongsheng refinery china free sample

SINGAPORE, Oct 14 (Reuters) - Rongsheng Petrochemical, the trading arm of Chinese private refiner Zhejiang Petrochemical, has bought at least 5 million barrels of crude for delivery in December and January next year in preparation for starting a new crude unit by year-end, five trade sources said on Wednesday.

Rongsheng bought at least 3.5 million barrels of Upper Zakum crude from the United Arab Emirates and 1.5 million barrels of al-Shaheen crude from Qatar via a tender that closed on Tuesday, the sources said.

Rongsheng’s purchase helped absorbed some of the unsold supplies from last month as the company did not purchase any spot crude in past two months, the sources said.

Zhejiang Petrochemical plans to start trial runs at one of two new crude distillation units (CDUs) in the second phase of its refinery-petrochemical complex in east China’s Zhoushan by the end of this year, a company official told Reuters. Each CDU has a capacity of 200,000 barrels per day (bpd).

Zhejiang Petrochemical started up the first phase of its complex which includes a 400,000-bpd refinery and a 1.2 million tonne-per-year ethylene plant at the end of 2019. (Reporting by Florence Tan and Chen Aizhu, editing by Louise Heavens and Christian Schmollinger)

rongsheng refinery china free sample

BEIJING, Aug 14 (Reuters) - Rongsheng Petrochemical , the listed arm of a major shareholder in one of China’s biggest private oil refineries, expects demand for energy and chemical products to return to normal in the country in the second half of this year.

Rongsheng expects to start trial operations of the second phase of the refining project, adding another 400,000 bpd of refining capacity and 1.4 million tonnes of ethylene production capacity in the fourth quarter of 2020.

“We expect the effects of the coronavirus pandemic on energy and chemicals to have basically faded in spite of the possibility of new waves of outbreak,” said Quan Weiying, board secretary of Rongsheng, in response to Reuters questions in an online briefing.

But Li Shuirong, president of Rongsheng, told the briefing that it was still in the process of applying for an export quota and would adjust production based on market demand. (Reporting by Muyu Xu and Chen Aizhu; Editing by Jacqueline Wong)

rongsheng refinery china free sample

Zhejiang Petroleum & Chemical Co Ltd, one of two new major refineries built in China in 2019, said it has started up the remaining units in the first phase of its refinery and petrochemical complex.

The complex, in east China’s Zhoushan city, is now producing oil products and chemicals to commercial specifications, Zhejiang Petrochemical said on its website.

The company, 51% owned by private chemical group Zhejiang Rongsheng Holdings, said it has started test production at ethylene, aromatics and other downstream facilities, without giving further details.

Zhejiang Petrochemical started a first 200,000 barrels per day (bpd) crude processing unit in late May, following on from the start of a 400,000-bpd refinery owned by another private chemical major Hengli Petrochemical.

rongsheng refinery china free sample

Were the extra barrels needed to satisfy unusually strong refinery demand? A desire to stockpile supply for later consumption? Or perhaps add more cushion to strategic reserves?

Also using satellite imagery, we’ve been monitoring a pair of mega-refineries being built in China that would help explain why the appetite for crude is rising.

rongsheng refinery china free sample

Rongsheng Petrochemical Co., Ltd. is a China-based company principally engaged in the research, development, manufacturing and distribution of refining products, petrochemicals and chemical fibers. Rongsheng has an annual production capability of 2 million tons of aromatic hydrocarbon, over 13 million tons of pure terephthalic acid (PTA), 2 million tons of PET, 1 million tons of POY and FDY, 0.45 millon tons of DTY. Rongsheng‘s total capability of PTA ranks the first of the world. Rongsheng persists in “Two-way of Vertical and Horizontal” development strategy and recently developed a green refining-petrochemical integrated project with a total capacity of 40 million tons per annum, via its subsidiary Zhejiang Petroleum and Chemicals Co., Ltd. (ZPC).

rongsheng refinery china free sample

China Merchants Energy Shipping (CMES), the energy transport unit of China Merchants Group, has signed a agreement with Rongsheng Petrochemical to form a strategic partnership.

Under the agreement, the two companies will jointly develop cooperation opportunities in the area of shipping, logistics, and financing, especially for the Rongsheng’s Zhoushan Green Petrochemical Base project, which started a trial operation recently.

Zhoushan Green Petrochemical Base project is a new integrated refinery and petrochemical project on Zhoushan Island, and it is set to become one of the world’s largest crude-to-chemicals complex.

rongsheng refinery china free sample

BEIJING, Aug 14 (Reuters) - Rongsheng Petrochemical , the listed arm of a major shareholder in one of China’s biggest private oil refineries, expects demand for energy and chemical products to return to normal in the country in the second half of this year.

Rongsheng expects to start trial operations of the second phase of the refining project, adding another 400,000 bpd of refining capacity and 1.4 million tonnes of ethylene production capacity in the fourth quarter of 2020.

“We expect the effects of the coronavirus pandemic on energy and chemicals to have basically faded in spite of the possibility of new waves of outbreak,” said Quan Weiying, board secretary of Rongsheng, in response to Reuters questions in an online briefing.

But Li Shuirong, president of Rongsheng, told the briefing that it was still in the process of applying for an export quota and would adjust production based on market demand. (Reporting by Muyu Xu and Chen Aizhu; Editing by Jacqueline Wong)

rongsheng refinery china free sample

Apparently confirming the view of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) that the U.S. is now regarded as just another one of its partners in a new global order that would see Beijing and its allies share the leadership position with Washington, Saudi Arabia last week reiterated its commitment to China as its “most reliable partner and supplier of crude oil,” along with broader assurances of its ongoing support in several other areas. That MbS seemingly now sees the U.S. as a partner just for its security considerations, with no meaningfulquid pro quoon Saudi Arabia’s part, whilst regarding China as its key partner economically and Russia as its key partner in energy matters, should not surprise the U.S. Back inMarch last year it was made clearenough at the annual China Development Forum hosted in Beijing, when Aramco chief executive officer, Amin Nasser said: “Ensuring the continuing security of China’s energy needs remains our highest priority - not just for the next five years but for the next 50 and beyond.” And yet, the U.S. is surprised by the apparent finalisation of the transition of Saudi Arabia away from Washington and towards China, which effectively marks the end of the1945 core agreementbetween the U.S. and Saudi Arabia that defined their relationship up until extremely recently. This transition has been seen most recently in therefusal of MbS to take a telephone callfrom President Joe Biden in which he was to ask for his help inbringing down economy-crimping high energy pricesand then in thehuge cut in collective OPEC oil productionthat has only added to energy-driven inflationary fears for global economies.

Apparently careless of these ramifications, Saudi Arabia last week stated that, in addition to continuing in its role as China’s partner of choice in the oil market, the two countries would continue “close communication and strengthen co-operation to address emerging risks and challenges,” according to a joint communique from Saudi Energy Minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman and Beijing"s National Energy Administrator, Zhang Jianhua. In the context of crude oil, according to Chinese Customs data, Saudi Arabia delivered 1.76 million bpd in shipments to China over the January to August period, marking an increase in its market share to 17.7 percent from 16.9 percent a year earlier.

Additionally, last week saw the two countries pledge to continue discussions on developing joint integrated refining and petrochemical complexes and to cooperate on the use of nuclear energy. Although flagged by Saudi Arabia and China as being ‘the peaceful use of nuclear energy’, the news just before Christmas 2021 that U.S. intelligence agencies had found that Saudi Arabia is now manufacturing its ownballistic missiles with the help of China– and given China’s long-running and extensive ‘assistance’ to Iran’s nuclear ambitions, as analysed in full inmy latest book on the global oil markets- ongoing U.S. fears about what Beijing’s endgame might be in building out the nuclear capabilities of key states in the Middle East will not have been alleviated.

This latest round of talks and agreements comes very shortly after the signing of amulti-pronged memorandum of understanding(MoU) between the Saudi Arabian Oil Company – formerly the Saudi Arabian American Oil Company – ‘Aramco’, and the China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec), which can be regarded as a critical step in China’s ongoing strategy to secure Saudi Arabia as a client state. As the president of Sinopec, Yu Baocai, himself put it: “The signing of the MoU introduces a new chapter of our partnership in the Kingdom…The two companies will join hands in renewing the vitality and scoring new progress of the Belt and Road Initiative [BRI] and [Saudi Arabia’s] Vision 2030.”

Crucially for China’s long-term plans in Saudi Arabia, it also covers opportunities for the construction of a huge manufacturing hub in King Salman Energy Park that will involve the ongoing, on-the-ground presence on Saudi Arabian soil of significant numbers of Chinese personnel: not just those directly related to the oil, gas, petrochemicals, and other hydrocarbons activities, but also a small army of security personnel to ensure the safety of China’s investments. At that point in early 2021, Aramco had a 25 percent stake in the 280,000 bpd Fujian refinery in south China through a joint venture with Sinopec (and the U.S.’s ExxonMobil) and had also earlier agreed (in 2018) to buy a 9 percent stake in China’s 800,000 bpd ZPC refinery from Rongsheng. Several other joint projects between China and Saudi Arabia that had been agreed in principle were delayed due to a combination of the ongoing effects of Covid-19, Aramco’scrushing dividend repayment schedule, and concern from both countries – especially China – on how Washington might react to this clear threat to the U.S.’s own long-running interests in, and geopolitical relationship with, Saudi Arabia.

Just prior to this, June saw Saudi Aramco’s senior vice president downstream, Mohammed Y. Al Qahtani, announce the creation of a‘one-stop shop’provided by his company in China’s Shandong. “The ongoing energy crisis, for example, is a direct result of fragile international transition plans which have arbitrarily ignored energy security and affordability for all,” he said. “The world needs clear-eyed thinking on such issues. That’s why we highly admire China’s 14th Five Year Plan for prioritising energy security and stability, acknowledging its crucial role in economic development,” he added. The megaproject in Shandong, which is home to around 26 percent of China’s refining capacity and is a key destination for Saudi Aramco’s crude oil exports, will broadly involve the flagship Saudi oil and gas giant creating “stronger ties with the world’s largest oil exporter [that] would enhance China’s energy security, especially as we work on increasing our production capacity to 13 million barrels per day,” according to Al Qahtani. Aside from thefact that Saudi Arabia still cannot produceanywhere near 13 million barrels per day of crude oil, closer cooperation between Aramco and China will mean Saudi Arabia investing heavily in the build-out of a large, integrated downstream business across the country in tandem with its Chinese partners

Given the transition of Saudi Arabia away from the U.S. and towards China – and the senior Saudis do look at the issue in these terms, whatever they say publicly – there is also every reason to expect Riyadh to continue to back China’s efforts to undermine the power of the U.S. dollar in the global energy markets as well. Not only is Saudi Arabia now a prime mover in advancing the China-GCC Free Trade Agreement (FTA) – a key aim of which is to forge a “deeper strategic cooperation in a region where U.S. dominance is showing signs of retreat” – but also the Kingdom is now a prime advocate forswitching away from the hegemony of U.S. dollarsin the pricing of global oil and gas.

Just after China made a crucial face-saving offer to MbS to privately buy the entire 5 percent stake in Saudi Aramco that he originally wanted to float but could not entice Western investors to buy, the then-Saudi Vice Minister of Economy and Planning, Mohammed al-Tuwaijri, told a Saudi-China conference in Jeddah that: “We will be very willing to consider funding in renminbi and other Chinese products.” He added: “China is by far one of the top markets’ to diversify the funding…[and] we will also access other technical markets in terms of unique funding opportunities, private placements, panda bonds and others.” Moreover,recent reportsstate that long-running talks between Saudi Arabia and China for Saudi to price and receive payments for some of its oil sales in Chinese renminbi rather than in U.S. dollars have intensified in the past few months.

rongsheng refinery china free sample

In Asia and the Middle East, at least nine refinery projects are beginning operations or are scheduled to come online before the end of 2023. At their current planned capacities, they will add 2.9 million bpd of global refinery capacity once fully operational.

The scheduled expansions follow a period of reduced global refining capacity. Net global capacity declined in 2021 for the first time in 30 years, according to the IEA. The new refinery projects would increase production of refined products, such as gasoline and diesel, and in turn, they might reduce the current high prices for these products.

China’s refinery capacity is scheduled to increase significantly in 2022. The Shenghong Petrochemical facility in Lianyungang has an estimated capacity of 320 000 bpd, and they report that trial crude oil processing operations began in May 2022. In addition, PetroChina’s 400 000 bpd Jieyang refinery is expected to come online in 3Q22. A planned 400 000 bpd Phase II capacity expansion also began operations earlier in 2022 at Zhejiang Petrochemical Corp.’s Rongsheng facility.

Outside of China, the 300 000 bpd Malaysian Pengerang refinery (also known as the RAPID refinery) restarted in May 2022, after a fire forced the refinery to shut down in March 2020. In India, the Visakha Refinery is undergoing a major expansion, scheduled to add 135 000 bpd by 2023.

New projects in the Middle East are also likely to be an important source of new refining capacity. The 400 000 bpd Jizan refinery in Saudi Arabia reportedly came online in late 2021 and began exporting petroleum products earlier in 2022. More recently, the 615 000 bpd Al Zour refinery in Kuwait — the largest in the country when it becomes fully operational — began initial operations earlier this year. A new 140 000 bpd refinery is scheduled to come online in Karbala, Iraq, in September 2022, targeting fully-operational status by 2023. A new 230 000 bpd refinery is set to come online in Duqm, Oman, likely in early 2023.

These estimates do not necessarily include all ongoing refinery capacity expansions. Moreover, many of these projects have already been subject to major delays, and the possibility of partial starts or continued delays related to logistics, construction, labour, finances, political complications, or other factors may cause these projects to come online later than estimated. Although the potential for project complications and cancellations is always a significant risk, these projects could otherwise account for an increase of nearly 3.0 million bpd of new refining capacity by the end of 2023.