State-owned Empresa Nacional del Petroleo (Enap), has let a contract to Fluor Corp., Irving, Tex., to provide engineering, procurement, and construction on a project aimed at improving environmental performance of subsidiary Enap Refinerias SA’s 116,000-b/d Bio Bio refinery at Hualpen, in Chile’s Bio Bio region.
Fluor will deliver EPC services for a series of installations designed to treat residual gas generated in the refinery’s fluid catalytic cracking unit to help reduce emissions at the site, the service provider said.
Alongside providing EPC services for a flue gas steam generator, wet gas scrubber, and purge treatment unit, Fluor also will be responsible for interconnections between the new and existing installations.
Fluor, which booked the undisclosed contract value in fourth-quarter 2016, said it will execute its scope of work on the contract during the refinery’s planned turnaround scheduled for later this year.
Ongoing upgrades
This latest project at Bio Bio comes as part of Enap’s program to fulfill several short and long-term commitments to Chilean legal and regulatory authorities under which Enap pledges to invest in projects and initiatives intended to reduce impacts of the refinery’s operations on the surrounding environment.
Part of an action plan for improving Bio Bio’s current atmospheric-emissions abatement systems that Enap previously submitted to Chile’s Superintendency of the Environment, addition of the wet gas scrubber specifically aims to reduce emissions of fine particulate matter resulting from continuous regeneration of catalyst at the refinery’s FCC, the company said.
A separate project at Bio Bio involved construction and installation of a tank to accumulate acid waters, including the acid water tank’s integration with the refinery’s existing Acid Water Treatment Plants Nos. 2 and 3.
Part of Enap’s pledge to Chile’s Court of Appeals of Concepcion to mitigate impacts of odors arising from processing activities on the refinery’s adjoining communities, the tank—which was scheduled for startup by yearend 2016—will target reducing emissions of odor-generating gases, Enap said.
Between Jan. 1 and June 30, 2016, Enap had invested $5 million into these environmental projects and initiatives at Bio Bio, the company said in its latest interim report.
Contact Robert Brelsford at [email protected].
