Downstream news from North and South America

Brazil

Petrobras has raised US$ 67 billion from a share sale. This has beaten all previous share sale records. Banks including, Merrill Lynch, HSBC, Credit Suisse and JP Morgan were used to manage the sale.

California

ConocoPhillips reported two separate cases of flaring on 20^th September. One case was at the 139 000 bpd Wilmington refinery the other at the Carson facility.

Gulf Coast

Valero Energy Corp. is recommencing plans to construct two hydrocrackers at facilities on the gulf coast. The 50 000 bpd units will be added to the Port Arthur, Texas and St. Charles, Louisiana facilities. Construction will cost US$ 1.5 and 1.4 billion respectively.

North Dakota

Corval Group are looking to construct a refinery that will process between 20 000 and 34 000 bpd. The facility will cost between US$ 650 and 700 million depending on processing size and will be online by the end of 2015.

Ohio

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act has given the state of Ohio US$ 8 million to invest in biofuel production. The state will use it to boost biofuel production by subsidising ethanol and biodiesel refining equipment.

Pennsylvania

Sunoco Refining will pay the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection US$ 130 000 in civil penalties. This is due to air quality violations at the company’s Marcus Hook refinery. There were releases of carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide between January and September 2009 at the facility.

Texas

Emissions from the restart of the sulfur recovery unit at BP’s Texas City refinery were reported on 20^th September. The SRU tripped offline on 18^th September during a storm.

Venezuela

PDVSA have announced that during October they will release US$ 3 billion in bonds. This will increase the company’s debt to US$ 24 billion. 

Read the article online at: https://www.hydrocarbonengineering.com/gas-processing/28092010/downstream_news_from_north_and_south_america/