Shell Nederland Raffinaderij BV has initiated what will be a phased restart of its 404,000-b/d Pernis refinery and integrated petrochemical production site in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, following a July 29 power outage that led to a fire and subsequent shutdown of the manufacturing site (OGJ Online, July 31, 2017).
Shell, which began recommissioning supporting units at the site on Aug. 8, expects Pernis will be back to full and normal operations within the next few weeks, said Jos van Winsen, the refinery’s general manager.
The company will continue the gradual and controlled restart of remaining processing plants in the coming weeks upon receiving state-of-fitness approvals on startup plans for each individual unit from DCMR Milieudienst Rijnmond, South Holland province’s joint environmental protection agency (OGJ Online, Aug. 1, 2017).
While Shell and DCMR continue to investigate both the July 29 incident as well as a subsequent release of hydrogen fluoride that occurred at the refinery on July 31, the investigation teams have confirmed that neither of the upsets were caused by overdue maintenance, said van Winsen.
The Pernis facility has a permanent team of 120 on-site inspectors to monitor and control processing units, pipelines, and other installations, van Winsen told concerned community members at a meeting to address the recent events.
The operator has yet to determine a detailed timeline for full recommissioning of operations at the site.
Contact Robert Brelsford at [email protected].
