Environmental Projects Dominate ConocoPhillips' Billion Dollar Refinery Capital Spending Program

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Researched by Industrialinfo.com (Industrial Information Resources, Incorporated; Houston, Texas). ConocoPhillips (NYSE:COP) (Houston, Texas), like other U.S. petroleum refiners, is focusing its future capital spending programs to complete environmental and regulatory driven projects. The main thrust is to meet upcoming EPA mandates for low sulfur gasoline and diesel fuels.

Since the beginning of the year, Industrialinfo.com, as part of its Petroleum Refining Database Capital Project Tracking, has identified 72 projects at ConocoPhillips owned petroleum refineries representing nearly $1.2 billion in capital spending. These projects will take place at 16 different refineries in the U.S. The majority of these projects totaling $862.5 million will be for environmentally driven projects, mainly desulfurization units in order to comply with upcoming low sulfur gasoline and diesel mandates. The company has desulfurization unit additions in the works at seven of its U.S. refineries. The largest environmentally driven project in the works for the company is a $130 million diesel hydrotreater addition on the west coast. The remaining projects are upgrades, expansions, and unit additions.

In August, ConocoPhillips (NYSE:COP) (Houston, Texas) was created from the merger of Conoco Incorporated and Phillips Petroleum Company. The new company is the third-largest integrated U.S. energy company. On a global basis, it is the sixth largest publicly held energy company based on hydrocarbon reserves and production, and it is the fifth-largest global refiner.