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Lotos presses ahead with new base oils unit at Gdansk

  • Spanish Market: Oil products
  • 28/09/21

Polish integrated oil company Grupa Lotos has approved plans to add a Group II base oils unit at its 210,000 b/d Gdansk refinery on Poland's Baltic coast.

The firm said it has signed an engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract with Italian company Kinetics Technology to build the unit, as well as a new hydrocracker. Lotos estimates that the base oils plant will cost €320mn to construct and become operational in 2025.

The company said today that the capacity will be over 400,000 t/yr. Its previous guidance was 450,000 t/yr. Feedstock will come from Gdansk's hydrowax vacuum distillation Unit (HVDU).

The new unit will add to Gdansk's existing 250,000 t/yr Group I unit, which currently produces SN 150, SN 150+, SN 500 and bright stock for domestic and export markets. Demand for premium Group II base oils has been increasing in recent years as engine oil manufacturers respond to rising use of low-sulphur, fuel-efficient formulations. But over the past three months, Group II premiums over Group I prices have reached the widest since Argus began assessing the market, and this has prompted some blenders to either stick with or switch back to Group I where the grades are interchangeable in formulations.


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