$9-billion Nghi Son refinery ready for operation

After more than four months of finalising the pipeline’s quality, NSRP has successfully passed three rounds of inspections and assessments of the overall quality and safety of the entire plant.

$9 billion Nghi Son Refinrey is ready for operation

This is an important milestone for the project as it can now begin receiving crude oil for processing.

The plant is an integrated petrochemical refinery with a capacity of up to 10 million tonnes per year and the most advanced technology in the world.

According to NSRP’s deputy general director Dinh Van Ngoc, so far all the technical and mechanical issues of the plant have been handled and its quality is ensured.

The NSRP project has triple the construction size than the country's first refinery, Dung Quat Oil Refinery, and is kitted out with a range of modern technologies which are applied for the first time in Vietnam. In particular, NSRP boasts the most modern and advanced environmental treatment system in the world.

NSRP's leaders and the contractor signed milestone for plant's operation

Currently, NSRP has successfully completed 4,000 safe processes and passed the trial operation of more than 20 million safe hours of operation.

The plant will officially manufacture the first Paraxylene product in mid-April 2018 and will produce A95 petrol and diesel oil of EURO 5 quality in May 2018.

Speaking at the signing ceremony, Turki Al-Ajmi, NSRP's general director, said that the plant becoming ready to start is very important for the entire country.

“NSRP is of strategic importance, as it can meet Vietnam's growing demand for petrochemical refining products, which is essential for Vietnam's rapid industrialisation and modernisation,” said Al-Ajmi.

Assessing the technologies of the plant, Junzo Yamamoto, the plant’s director, said that international safety standards will help the stable commercial operation of the project.

“We are now ready to carry out the operational inspection process and then the production phase. We will try our maintain the highest safety and quality standards throughout the operational process,” said Yamamoto.

Nghi Son Petrochemical Refinery is built at Nghi Son Economic Zone, Thanh Hoa province. The project has a total investment of over $9 billion and has a capacity of 10 million tonnes of crude oil a year.

It is invested by a consortium of Kuwait International Petrochemical Company (KPI, 35.1 per cent), Idemitsui Kosan (IKC, 35.1 per cent), and Mitsui Chemicals (MCI, 4.7 per cent). The rest is contributed by state-run Vietnam Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam). The plant will produce LPG, gasoline (RON 92, 95), diesel (high grade, conventional), kerosene/jet fuel, polypropylene, paraxylene, benzene, and sulfur products.