DAMMAM, 7 March 2007 — Saudi Aramco Shell Refinery Co. (SASREF) at Jubail have begun a major planned turnaround of activities throughout March to execute a major and comprehensive maintenance of all units.
The units of the Distillation Complex 2, including the Distillation Unit, the Visbreaker Unit, the Thermal Cracker Unit, other support units and the Hydro-cracker and the Hydrogen Manufacturing Units will all be shut down. Both manufacturing and operations will be drawn to a close.
Sasref President Mohammad Al-Omair said that all required preparation work and pre-shutdown activities have been completed to ensure things go as planned and to target. He added that there are still challenges that the turnaround execution teams will have to overcome such as ensuring quality standards are met without a loss of time, injury and without harming the environment, as per schedule and within the approved budget.
Al-Omair expressed trust in the turnaround teams that consist of both SASREF staff and contractors. He believed they will be able to execute the turnaround in the best manner and achieve the next safety milestone. The current turnaround cycle comes after four years since the previous turnaround cycle. The Hydro-cracker unit has been continuously running for more than 650 days without any feed interruption since the previous turnaround. This is a historical record that is unprecedented in SASREF’s 22-year history.
SASREF hopes to upgrade the hydro-cracker unit, which will increase its capacity from 7,300 to 7,500 ton per day of high quality white products. This will be instrumental in improving the refinery’s profitability. The turnaround scope of work will include major works such as inspection, replacement, repair, cleaning, overhauling, painting, insulation, civil works, electrical, instrumentation and mechanical works.
