EOL commissions HMU at Vadinar refinery

Essar Oil Ltd (EOL), a subsidiary of Essar Energy, has commissioned hydrogen manufacturing unit (HMU), third unit to be commissioned under the phase-I expansion at its Vadinar Refinery in Gujarat, the company informed in a statement issued on Monday.

EOL will commission six additional units by March 2012, thus completing a Rs 8,310-crore expansion project that will increase the Vadinar Refinery’s capacity and almost double its complexity, the company statement said.

Company's capacity will increase to 18 MMTPA (million metric tonnes per annum) or 375,000 bpd (barrels per day) from the current 14 MMTPA or 300,000 bpd.

The refinery complexity will reach to 11.8 up from 6.1 at present.

"The operational readiness of the amine regeneration unit (ARU) and the HMU is essential to support the smooth functioning of two key expansion units, the diesel hydrotreater (DHDT) and the vacuum gas oil hydrotreater (VGO-HT). The successive commissioning of the ARU and HMU within a week from each other has therefore made it possible for us to adhere to our project time lines," said Lalit Gupta, MD and CEO, Essar Oil.

The HMU has an installed capacity to generate 130 kNm3/hr of hydrogen gas, making it among the largest units in the world with HTER (Heat Exchanger Reformer) technology.

An optimisation project is also under execution at the refinery to further increase the capacity to 20 MMTPA (405,000 bpd) by September 2012, the company stated.

The capacity expansion, complexity enhancement and subsequent optimisation will give the Vadinar refinery the capability to process over 80 per cent heavy and ultra-heavy crudes, which are lower at cost than light crudes. In terms of product yield, the expanded Vadinar Refinery will have the flexibility to produce higher value products, including pet coke.