Enterprise Products Partners LP (EPP) plans to build a fully refrigerated ethane export plant on the Texas Gulf Coast. EPP has executed long-term contracts to support the development, designed to have an aggregate loading rate of about 10,000 bbl/hr, or as much as 240,000 b/d. EPP expects the plant, which it describes as the largest in the world, to begin operations in third-quarter 2016.

State Oil Co. of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) has started additional maintenance on units within its 239,000-b/d Heydar Aliyev (formerly New Baku) refinery at Baku, Azerbaijan.

Suncor Energy Inc. has started planned maintenance at its 137,000-b/d refinery in Montreal, Que.

LyondellBasell has ceased discussions with Sotragem SA, Monaco, for the sale of its shuttered 105,000-b/d Berre refinery in France to Sotragem SAM.

Kuwait National Petroleum Co. (KNPC) has finalized lump-sum turnkey contracts previously let to three groups of oil and gas service providers for work related to its Clean Fuels Project (CFP) at the Mina Abdullah and Mina Al Ahmadi refineries in southern Kuwait.

Higher North American crude oil production, shrinking product markets, and a pair of federal regulations have significantly affected the US refining outlook, the US Government Accountability Office said in an Apr. 14 report.

Shintech Inc., the US subsidiary of Shin-Etsu Chemical Co. Ltd., Tokyo, has applied to the Louisiana Department of Environment Quality (LDEQ) for a permit to build a grassroots ethylene plant.