Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA) has announced that its Isla refinery, located in Curacao, has continued its recovery process after the fire on 21st May at the distillation unit.
The thermal cracking plant 1 (TC-1) was put into operation as a crude distiller, as it had several times in the past, allowing Isla to process part of the light/medium hydrocarbon that was destined for unit CD-3, which was affected by the incident last month, thus partially recovering processing capacity.
The refinery started up its CD-2B crude distiller, on 5 June, using heavy crude (Heavy Tía Juana).
Isla is operating at close to full processing capacity, with units TC-1, CD-2A and CD-2B in operation (CD-2A already was). The designated operational committee is deepening its investigations to determine the causes of the undesired event. Isla refinery officials have notified the authorities of Curacao and they are working together with them.
Isla has sufficient inventory of products to continue supplying the local Curacao market in a timely and reliable manner; its insurance will cover repair costs.
Read the article online at: https://www.hydrocarbonengineering.com/refining/15062017/isla-refinery-continues-recovery/