MOSCOW (MRC) -- Royal Dutch Shell Plc is preparing to restart the crude distillation units (CDUs) at its 318,000 bpd joint-venture Deer Park, Texas refinery, reported Hydrocarbonprocessing with reference to sources familiar with plant operations.
The restart of the 270,000-bpd DU-2 CDU and the 70,000-bpd DU-1 CDU between Sunday night and Monday, assuming no setbacks, will begin the restart of all other units at the refinery, the sources said.
A Shell spokesman did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
Shell began preparing to restart the crude units on Saturday. The CDUs were shut by a pump seal failure on Feb. 14. Other units at the refinery were shut on Feb. 15 because of the effects of severe cold weather.
The Deer Park refinery is last to begin restarting following the severe cold that cascaded across the US Gulf Coast in mid-February.
The Deer Park refinery is a 50-50 joint-venture between Shell and Mexico’s national oil company, Pemex. Shell is the managing partner.
As MRC informed before, Royal Dutch Shell Plc pushed back the restart of its 318,000 bpd joint-venture Deer Park, Texas, refinery to March 13. Shell had planned to restart the 270,000-bpd DU-2 crude distillation unit (CDU), the largest at the refinery, by early last week. Shell is continuing repairs at the refinery to enable it to restart from the Feb. 15 shutdown because of cold weather. Repairs could last until April.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 241,030 tonnes in January 2021 versus 217,890 tonnes a year earlier. Only shipments of low density polyethylene (LDPE) and high density polyethylene (HDPE) increased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market reached 141,870 tonnes in January 2021 versus 123,520 tonnes a year earlier. Supply of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased.
Royal Dutch Shell plc is an Anglo-Dutch multinational oil and gas company headquartered in The Hague, Netherlands and with its registered office in London, United Kingdom. It is the biggest company in the world in terms of revenue and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors". Shell is vertically integrated and is active in every area of the oil and gas industry, including exploration and production, refining, distribution and marketing, petrochemicals, power generation and trading.
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