Baku, Azerbaijan, Oct. 12
By Maksim Tsurkov – Trend:
The cost of building the Star oil refinery in Turkey increased to $6 billion, Zaur Gahramanov, head of SOCAR Turkey Enerji (subsidiary of Azerbaijan’s state oil company SOCAR), told reporters in Baku Oct. 12.
He noted that the plant was designed in 2011 based on the market needs.
“Now, these requirements have changed, and it was decided to expand the range of supplied oil and delivered products, accordingly. Because of this, changes were made to the plant construction, taking into account the additional storage capacity. This was the reason for the increase in the project cost to about $6 billion,” Gahramanov said.
He added that SOCAR is looking for alternative funding sources.
“President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev signed a decree on increasing the authorized capital of the Star refinery by $1 billion. This does not mean that all will be paid by the State Oil Fund. A part will be financed through SOCAR’s internal resources, and we will try to attract another part from the market.”
Construction of Star oil refinery has been completed by 95 percent.
The refinery will be able to process 10 million tons of oil per year with storage capacity volume of 1.6 million cubic meters. The plant will annually produce 1.6 million tons of naphtha, 5 million tons of diesel fuel, 1.6 million tons of jet fuel, 300,000 tons of liquefied petroleum gas and 1 million tons of raw materials for the manufacture of petrochemicals.
