MOSCOW (MRC) -- Electrical power was being restored on Thursday night to PBF Energy's 190,000-bpd Chalmette, Louisiana refinery for the first time, reported Reuters with reference to sources familiar with plant operations.
PBF may begin restarting refinery units over the weekend, the sources said, but the process is expected to be slow as the electrical power supply will be reduced due to damage to the power grid from Hurricane Ida.
A PBF spokesman was not immediately available to comment.
The Chalmette refinery was knocked out by a power outage on Sunday as Hurricane Ida crossed the New Orleans area. PBF had reduced production.
PBF is the second refinery to begin restarting after being knocked out by the hurricane, which was one of the most powerful to strike Louisiana.
As MRC wrote before, ExxonMobil began restarting its Baton Rouge, Louisiana refinery on Tuesday. The US Energy Department authorized the release on Thursday of 1.5 million barrels of crude oil from the national Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) to the Baton Rouge refinery. Exxon spokesperson Julie King said on Thursday because of transportation interruptions, Exxon requested the crude from the SPR for the refinery, which is restarting as utilities are restored.
Ethylene and propylene are the main feedstocks for the production of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), respectively.
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 1,176,860 tonnes in the first half of 2021, up by 5% year on year. Shipments of exclusively low density polyethylene (LDPE) decreased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market were 727,160 tonnes in the first six months of 2021, up by 31% year on year. Supply of homopolymer PP and block-copolymers of propylene (PP block copolymers) increased. Supply of statistical copolymers of propylene (PP random copolymers) subsided.
MRC