Amuay Refinery's Naphtha Hydrotreater Back Online After Fire

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Researched by Industrialinfo Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--The 25,000-barrel-per-day (BBL/d) Naphtha Hydrotreater Unit 1 at Petroleos de Venezuela S.A.'s (PDVSA) (Caracas) Amuay refinery at the Paraguana Refining Center in Venezuela, is online after being shutdown because of an unexpected fire on December 24, 2008.

By the time the fire occurred, PDVSA's 635,000-BBL/d Amuay Refinery had already reached normal rates after an unexpected shutdown occurred on December 18, 2008 at the Cardon refinery because of a power outage at the plant. Operations at the Amuay refinery remained curtailed for several days, with the five crude units each operating at approximately 40,000 BBL/d. Central Hidrogeno Paraguana, the external hydrogen plant that was affected by the power problem, was restarted on December 22, 2008. Currently, the whole refinery is processing 494,000 BBL/d and all units are running without inconveniences.

The hydrotreatment's furnace fire occurred because of technical problems. Authorities stated that the affected furnace was isolated, and the unit was restarted before the end of the year. The plant is currently processing 18,000 BBL/d with only the second furnace online. The affected furnace needs complete repairs. PDVSA, however, has not yet selected the company that will perform this work. The 30,000-BBL/d Naphtha Hydrotreater Unit 2 is processing at full capacity.

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