Hyundai E&C has completed major work at the Basra refinery upgrading facilities site in Iraq and begun commissioning.
Hyundai E&C said on the 28th that on the 25th (local time) at the Basra refinery upgrading facilities construction site in southern Iraq, key figures including Iraq Prime Minister Muhammad Shia' Al-Sudani, Iraq Oil Minister Hayan Abdul Ghani, Ambassador to Iraq Lee Jun-il, and Hyundai E&C Plant Business Division Head Ryu Sung-an attended a ceremony to mark the first gasoline production.
The project that Hyundai E&C won in 2020 is an upgrading facility construction project that uses residue oil (petroleum sludge produced during crude oil refining) from the refinery in the southern city of Basra, about 450 kilometers southeast of the capital Baghdad, as feedstock to produce up to 24,000 barrels per day of gasoline.
Upgrading facilities convert heavy oils such as bunker C oil and asphalt, which are produced during crude oil refining, into higher value-added gasoline or diesel. Hyundai E&C carried out this project, worth 2 trillion won, together with Japan's JGC on a lump-sum turnkey basis covering engineering, procurement, construction, and commissioning.
Iraq, which boasts the world's fifth-largest oil reserves, has many refineries that are outdated or damaged and relies on gasoline imports, so the government has pushed to expand and modernize facilities. A Hyundai E&C official said that once the Basra refinery upgrading facilities go into full operation early next year, Iraq's energy self-sufficiency and crude oil production revenue are expected to improve.
A Hyundai E&C official said, "We are pleased to have applied advanced safety and quality systems to complete the 60-month construction without any accidents and successfully produce gasoline," and added, "With the Iraqi government's trust, we successfully executed the upgrading facilities project and won the mega seawater treatment facilities project (WIP), and we will continue to actively participate in Iraq's reconstruction projects and high value-added plant projects going forward."
Since entering Iraq with phase one of the Basra sewer project in 1978, Hyundai E&C has built about 40 key national facilities worth $12 billion, including the Northern Railway, the Karbala refinery project, and the seawater treatment facilities project.