Fire at Chilean Refinery Kills One, Injures Three

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--A fire broke out October 9, 2007, at an Aconcagua refinery in Concon, about 90 miles from the capital of Santiago, killing one worker and injuring three others. The fire, which was triggered when an air cooler connected to a stripper in the reforming unit’s desulfurizer broke, caused the refinery’s continuous catalyst regeneration (CCR) and hydrogen units to go offline.

However, Enap authorities have not shut down all of the processing units. The CCR unit is completely offline, but the hydrogen unit will be shut down for at least a month. Authorities have not yet been told the details of the damage. Topping 1 and Vacuum 1 were not shut down; Topping 2, Vacuum 2 and Alkylation were in the process of restarting October 10, 2007, without any reported inconveniences. The Diesel Hydrotreater is online.

Enap, Chile’s state-owned oil company, has three refineries in the country: Aconcagua, Bio Bio and Gregorio. The Aconcagua refinery in Concon, which was inaugurated in 1955, has a total production capacity of 18,000 cubic meters per day.

Chile, which depends on natural gas from Argentina, has been buying diesel fuel from the U.S. Chileans are particularly sensitive to any cuts in fuel supply. Even though Enap authorities have said that the fuel supply remained at normal levels a day after the fire, Aconcagua’s situation might increase Chile’s difficulty to meet the country’s fuel demand.

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