KBR Wins Processing Contract for Cambodia's First Refinery

---

Written by Richard Finlayson, Senior International Editor for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Cambodia's first refinery is scheduled for commercial operations in 2015. The plant will have a crude oil processing capacity of 5 million tons per year, and it is being promoted as a major factor in boosting the country's economic development.

The refinery will be constructed by China Perfect Machine Corporation (CPMC), in which state-owned Sinomach, China's largest machinery manufacturer, has a 54.1% interest. Engineering design will be provided by Tianjin Petrochemical Engineering Design (TPED), a Sinomach subsidiary and a certified design institute that provides engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) services for energy companies in China.

The project is funded by the Cambodian National Petroleum Authority, Cambodian HKT Special Economic Zone and Hong Kong Diamond Industry Company.

Cambodian Petrochemical Company (CPC) has awarded a contract for licensing and engineering services at the Veba combi cracker (VCC) unit in the Kampong Som Petrochemical Industrial Zone to KBR (NYSE:KBR) (Houston, Texas). TPED is the EPC contractor for the unit. TPED executed the agreements on behalf of CPC.

Under the scope of the contract, KBR will provide license and basic engineering services for the 1.2 million-ton-per-annum VCC units that will process refinery vacuum residues into high-value naphtha and Euro 5 diesel products.

"The VCC technology was selected after a careful evaluation of the process," said Li Chengchun, chief executive officer of CPC. "The high-residue conversion and finished products quality will significantly improve the economics of our facility. VCC can process a wide range of residues and fuel oil, which greatly enhances our crude flexibility and had a big influence on the selection of our refinery configuration."

John Derbyshire, the president of KBR Technology, said that the contract marks the fourth license since acquiring the right to license VCC in 2010. The other three are under construction.

According to KBR's website, the VCC is a slurry phase hydrocracking/hydrogenation process for converting petroleum residues at very high conversion rates and liquid yields into high-quality distillates or synthetic crude oil in the refining, upstream field upgrading, and coal-to-liquids markets.

Industrial Info Resources (IIR), with global headquarters in Sugar Land, Texas, and eight offices outside of North America, is the leading provider of global market intelligence specializing in the industrial process, heavy manufacturing and energy markets. Industrial Info's quality-assurance philosophy, the Living Forward Reporting Principle™, provides up-to-the-minute intelligence on what's happening now, while constantly keeping track of future opportunities.