Calumet to restart US base oil plant damaged by explosion

18 February 2010 10:05  [Source: ICIS news]

LONDON (ICIS news)--Calumet plans to restart its base oil plant at Shreveport, Louisiana, in the US, which has had curtailed base oil and wax production after an explosion on 5 February damaged the plant's scrubber unit, a company official said on Thursday.

It would take a few days to line out the unit, but the company expects to be producing base oils by the weekend, Calumet spokesperson Liz Swaine said.

“We will be restarting our pollution control devices in the next 24 to 48 hours. Once that is accomplished, we will start bringing our other units back up, including our catalytic lube oil units,” said Swaine.

“Once we achieve our minimum rates, we’ll begin to ramp up to target capacities,” she said.

The Shreveport refinery has continued to produce fuel products but had to curtail lube production following the 5 February explosion.

The incident, which did not result in injuries or damage any processing units, caused serious damage to a critical pollution control device at the facility, Swain said.

Base oil inventories have been depleted as a result, and the first few runs will be to catch up on back orders, a source close to the company said.

Calumet’s Shreveport plant produces around 4,800 bbl/day of Group I base oils, 7,000 bbl/day of Group II base oils and 100 bbl/day of naphthenic base oils.

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Author: Heather Doyle

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