Sinopec Jinling 2010 Oil Processing May Be 4% Below Target

Beijing, September 1st, 2010 - China Petroleum & Chemical Corp.’s Jinling refinery may process 4 percent less oil than an original target for this year as demand isn’t “as good as” expected, said the head of the plant.

The refinery may process 13 million tons of crude this year, or 260,000 barrels a day, compared with the plan of 13.5 million tons assigned by China Petroleum & Chemical, Zhang Dafu, chairman of the plant, said in a telephone interview from Nanjing city in eastern China.

Sinopec, as China Petroleum & Chemical is known, previously planned to expand Jinling’s refining capacity by 33 percent to 18 million tons a year by 2010. It is now studying a plan to upgrade oil processing units to improve fuel quality, Zhang said. Details such as investment and timeframe haven’t been decided, he said.

“We are changing our direction to upgrade units for fuel quality improvement instead of expanding refining capacity by a big amount,” Zhang said, without providing details.

Sinopec Jinling has an annual capacity of 13.5 million tons, and its monthly processing volume is currently about 1.1 million tons, or almost at its designed capacity, Zhang said. The plant processed 12.2 million tons of oil in 2009, he said.

The plant completed maintenance on major refining units in the first half and will have occasional shutdowns of smaller units during the rest of the year, he said. - Bloomberg