MOSCOW (MRC) -- ExxonMobil Corp does not have a timeline for restarting fuel-producing units at its second-largest US refinery following a fire Wednesday that cut production, reported Reuters with reference to sources, as the shutdown boosted gasoline prices on Thursday.
Some units remain in operation at the refinery including a crude distillation unit (CDU), gasoline-producing fluidic catalytic cracking unit (FCCU) and a coker, the sources said.
A blaze on Wednesday cut output at Exxon’s 502,500 barrel-per-day (bpd) Baton Rouge, Louisiana, refinery. It was the third Exxon petrochemical plant along the US Gulf Coast to suffer damage in less than a year. 2
No injuries were reported because of the fire that broke out from a natural gas pipeline shortly before midnight on Tuesday and burned for about seven hours on Wednesday, the sources said.
The blaze affected pipes laid on racks 50 feet in the air, and forced the shutdown of multiple units at the oil refinery and adjoining chemical plant, the sources said.
The fire forced the shutdown of three CDUs and an FCCU, but was confined to the pipe bundle where it broke out.
Operations at the refinery and chemical plant continue, Exxon spokesman Jeremy Eikenberry said on Thursday. He declined to discuss the status of individual processing units.
Exxon was meeting contractual commitments and expected to meet all customer commitments, he said.
The company and other refiners are suffering from weak margins due to excess supplies and falling demand for some fuels. Exxon US refining profits fell 42% last year over 2018 due to weak margins and higher maintenance costs.
CDUs are the heart of the refining process, providing the primary breakdown of crude oil into hydrocarbon feedstocks that other production units convert into motor fuels and feedstocks for plastics.
As MRC informed before, in September 2019, ExxonMobil announced plans to spend GBP140 million over the next two years in an additional investment program at its Fife ethylene plant, which has a capacity of more than 800,000 t/y.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,093,260 tonnes in 2019, up by 6% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. PE shipments rose from both domestic producers and foreign suppliers. The estimated PP consumption in the Russian market was 1,260,400 tonnes in January-December 2019, up by 4% year on year. Supply of almost all grades of propylene polymers increased, except for statistical copolymers of propylene (PP random copolymers).
ExxonMobil is the largest non-government owned company in the energy industry and produces about 3% of the world's oil and about 2% of the world's energy.
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