National Refinery Ltd. plans to boost the production capacity of its base oil plant in Pakistan and has contracted a Chinese company to do the work.
NRL disclosed in a Pakistan Stock Exchange regulatory filing that it signed an engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning contract for the Lube-I Refinery at its base oil plant in the Korangi Industrial Area of Karachi. The project will revamp a two-stage distillation unit of Lube-I, one of two base oil units at the plant.
The project will increase feedstock throughput capacity for Lube-I Refinery by 5,000 barrels per day, or 40 percent, and will raise base oil production capacity from 70,000 metric tons per year to 76,000 t/y, a senior planning engineer at NRL told Lube Report. The overall project is estimated to cost Rs 1.3 billion (U.S. 11.8 million), and Hualus contract is for $8.5 million.
The official added that the expansion project will likely be completed in the first quarter of 2019, and it will make NRL a more prominent player in Pakistans lubes industry. NRLs refinery is the only one in Pakistan that has a base oil unit.
NRL is also expanding its production capacity of various other products.