Croatia’s INA to modernize Rijeka refinery

Jan. 14, 2019
Croatia’s INA Industrija Nafte DD has approved a more-than $617-million plan to modernize its 90,000-b/d Rijeka refinery along the northern part of the Adriatic Sea as part of an organizational strategy to boost performance and competitiveness of its Croatian refining business.

Croatia’s INA Industrija Nafte DD has approved a more-than $617-million plan to modernize its 90,000-b/d Rijeka refinery along the northern part of the Adriatic Sea as part of an organizational strategy to boost performance and competitiveness of its Croatian refining business.

Part of its INA Downstream 2023 New Course program, the proposed investment plan—which intends to help reduce a current $154 million/year in average losses of the refining business by ensuring long-term sustainability and profitability of refining and marketing operations—would involve concentration of crude processing activities at the Rijeka refinery and conversion of the company’s 44,000-b/d refinery in Sisak into a biorefining and petrochemical production site for bitumen, renewables, and lubricants, as well as equipping it to perform as a modern logistics hub, INA said.

The proposed 3-year conversion process would coincide with the concurrent construction of a heavy residue upgrading plant—or delayed coking unit (DCU)—at the Rijeka refinery, which would include a delayed coker, a coke port, storage installations, as well related pipelines and off sites (OGJ Online, Jan. 26, 2018).

INA—which initiated the official tendering process for construction of Rijeka’s delayed coker and associated installations in late 2017—said it expects to take final investment decision this year on the DCU project, which, if approved, would be commissioned in 2023.

Further details regarding the new downstream program have yet to be disclosed.

INA is jointly owned by Hungary’s MOL Group subsidiary MOL PLC 49.1%, the Republic of Croatia 44.8%, and private and institutional investors 6.1%.

Contact Robert Brelsford at [email protected].