Japan invests in Atyrau refinery

Kazakhstan's Atyrau refinery has signed a $297.5 million loan agreement with Japan Bank for International Cooperation and Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ for construction of an advanced oil processing center, KazMunaiGas national company’s website reports. The agreement between the refinery and the Japanese banks was signed on August 8 in Tokyo. The loan period is 13.5 years. According to Director General of Atyrau refinery Talgat Baitaziyev, construction of the center will allow to increase oil refining efficiency to 85 percent by 2016. Oil processing volume will reach 5.5 million tons per year. Production of high-octane petrol will raise from 600 thousand tons to 1.7 million tons per year. Production of diesel fuel will reach 1.4 million tons per year. The petrol will comply with Euro-5 standard. The contract for construction of the advanced oil processing center was signed in December 2011 between the Atyrau refinery and a consortium of Sinopec Engineering (China), Marubeni Corporation (Japan) and KazStroyService (Kazakhstan). The project is worth $1.7 billion. On June 6 Atyrau Refinery signed a loan agreement with Chinese Export-Import Bank on a loan of over $1 billion. Construction of the advanced oil processing center at Atyrau refinery was part of Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s State-of-the Union Address. The project is aimed at processing 2.4 million tons of oil per year. Kazakhstan has three oil refineries in Atyrau, Shymkent and Pavlodar.