PDVSA: Only One Refinery Affected by Last Week's Major Blackout in Venezuela

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--According to PDVSA, only one of the company's refineries was affected by the major power outage last week that affect about 40% of Venezuela. The outage interrupted all activity at the Puerto La Cruz refinery in Anzoategui State. The hydroprocessing area of the plant and all of the units (CRR, aromatics, SRU, amine, sour water stripper, diesel hydrotreater and naphtha hydrotreater) were brought back online on April 29, 2008, after power was restored. The other areas of the refinery, the middle conversion (FCC, HF alkylation, gas-treatment system and Merox), conversion and distillation areas, had their own power-generation facilities that allowed them to continue processing at minimum rates during the outage. As of May 1, all of the refinery's units were processing at normal rates.

PDVSA's other refineries:

•El Palito in Carabobo State
•Paraguana Refining Complex (PRC)
•Amuay, a part of the PRC
• San Roque in Anzoategui State
•Bajo Grande in Zulia State

The outage originated from a high-tension power line in Guarico State, which affected 13 states and the capital for almost five hours. Power was gradually restored by Tuesday night, April 29, 2008, to about half of Venezuela. For more details, view related May 1, 2008, news article - Two Power Plants Restore Power after Tuesday's Major Blackout in Venezuela.

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