BAKU, Azerbaijan, June 8. Specialists of SOCAR Downstream (SOCAR's oil and gas refining structure) have started providing consulting services for the Congolaise de Raffinage (CORAF) oil refinery in the Republic of Congo, an informed source told Trend.
Considering that SOCAR Trading has been selling oil and a portion of oil products from the CORAF refinery on the global market since 2023 and is keen on improving the quality of their products, they are interested in this venture.
"This enterprise has been operating for more than 40 years, and its modernization is required. Azerbaijani experts have started consulting their colleagues from the Republic of Congo on equipment and technological processes,” he noted.
On April 4 in Baku, the “National Oil Corporation of the Republic of Congo” (SNPC, which owns the CORAF refinery) and SOCAR signed an “Agreement on conditions for improvement and expansion of the Congolaise de Raffinage refinery.”
"The refinery's capacity is 27,000 barrels of oil per day, but it's currently around 20,000. The refinery needs reconstruction, and SOCAR experts recommend modernizing its units based on their current state,” the source said.
More than half of the petroleum products produced at this refinery go the extra mile to meet the domestic needs of the Republic of Congo.
Since December 1982, the CORAF refinery in Pointe Noire, near the Atlantic coast, has been the only refinery in the Republic of Congo, a member of OPEC since 2018.
Congo's oil reserves are estimated at 1.8 billion barrels.
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