Editor❜s Note
Key Developments in the Oil and Gas Refining Industry This Spring
This spring brought two important pieces of news from the oil and gas refining industry at once. First, Minister of Energy Yerlan Akkenzhenov announced the start of work on the project to build a fourth refinery. The parameters of the new plant as he set them out: a capacity of up to 10 mln tons per year, with the potential to become the centre of a petrochemical cluster, and a Samruk-Kazyna subsidiary as the client. Over the course of six months, an international engineering company will conduct comprehensive pre-project studies, based on which a decision will be made on whether to proceed with construction.
The key question is the feedstock supply. And, in the minister's words, the planned inclusion of Tengiz and Kashagan in the feedstock base means that the liberalisation of the fuel market will continue until cross-subsidisation and price distortions are fully eliminated.
The second important piece of news is the award of the EPC contract for the construction of the Karachaganak Gas Processing Plant to a consortium of Hyundai Engineering and the Kazakhstani subsidiary of SICIM. The plant, with a capacity of 5 bln cubic metres of raw gas per year, is planned for completion by 2030. This will solve the problem of gas supply to the country's northern regions and enable increased liquefied gas exports.
These projects are, admittedly, only outlined in broad strokes so far, and we hope to reveal their details in the magazine's coming issues. In this special issue, meanwhile, we report on what the refining, fuel, and chemical markets are living by today. There is also a new section: "Fuel and Transit." Thanks to geopolitical changes and cheap jet fuel, a unique opportunity has emerged for Kazakhstan to become a powerful regional aviation hub. Will we seize it?
Oleg Chervinskiy,
publisher