POL products’ storage capacity increases by 13.07%

Sep 04, 2019: The overall storage capacity of Motor Spirit (MS) and High Speed Diesel (HSD) oil witnessed around 13.07 percent increase during the fiscal year 2018-19 as compared to the corresponding year.

According to official data available, the storage capacity for both the MS and HSD oil has been increased from 1,712,691 MT to 1,936,550 MT during the period under review.

The MS oil storage capacity was enhanced from 490,408 Metric Ton (MT) to 594,299 MT, showing 21.18 percent increase during the period under review.

While, the HSD oil storage capacity was expanded from 1,222,283 MT to 1,342,251 MT, projecting 9.81 percent increase.

Meanwhile, a senior official privy to the petroleum sector developments told APP that the government was making all-out efforts to upgrade existing oil refineries and establish new deep conversion facilities for meeting the country’s fuel requirements in a smooth manner.

He said an unprecedented incentives package was in place for setting up new deep conservation oil refineries, enabling them to import machinery, vehicles, plants and equipment and other materials.

Elaborating the government efforts to achieve self-sufficiency in oil refining sector, the official said Byco Oil Pakistan Limited (Byco) had established an Oil Refinery at Hub, Balochistan, having capacity to purify 120,000 Barrel Per Day (5 million tons/annum) at a cost of $ 400 million.

Byco has also installed Single Buoy Mooring (SBM) facilities for transportation of imported crude oil and petroleum products from ships to the storage tanks. The capacity of said facility is 12 M. tons per annum.

Similarly, Attock Refinery Limited (ARL) has started producing Euro-II (0.05 % Sulphur HSD), besides it installed isomerization plant and enhanced the production of Motor Gasoline.

While, Pakistan Refinery Limited (PRL) has installed isomerization plant in 2016 and since then has doubled its production of Motor Gasoline.

Whereas, Pak Arab Refinery Limited (PARCO) is implementing its Coastal Refinery project at Khalifa Point, near Hub, Balochistan, which is a state of the art refinery having capacity of 250,000 barrels per day (over 11 Million tons per annum) with an estimated cost of over $ 5 billion.

APP