Azernews.Az

By Kamila Aliyeva

Atyrau oil refinery became the first in Kazakhstan to supply benzene - a raw material for petrochemicals - for export, Kazinform reported.

“In the past 2017, as many as 8,951 tons of benzene or 104 percent of the planned amount was produced. Since the beginning of the production of benzene, up to the present time, 14,380 tons of products have been produced and shipped. The entire product is exported to Russia. Commodity oil is responsible for the quality of compliance with the requirements of the international standard ASTM D 4734-08 with the availability of the certificate of compliance ‘Purified benzene-545’,” the press service of the Atyrau refinery reported.

Benzene is one of the most common petrochemical products. For example, in the physical weight of plastics its component is about 30 percent, in rubbers – 66 percent, in synthetic fibers - up to 80 percent. Benzene, which is widely used in industry, is the raw material for the production of medicines, various plastics, synthetic rubber and dyes.

Benzene at the Atyrau refinery is produced at the catalytic reformer - CCR, which is part of the complex for the production of aromatic hydrocarbons.

Kazakhstan has three major oil refineries - Atyrau, Shymkent and Pavlodar. All of them are being currently modernized.

The refining capacity of all the three plants will increase from 13.8 to 16.5 million tons after modernization of the refinery completes. Production of all types of light oil products, gasoline, diesel fuel and aviation kerosene will increase. All plants will produce gasoline for 2.3 million tons more. The production of diesel fuel will increase for 917,000 tons and aviation kerosene for 539,000 tons.

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Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva

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