Larger refineries integrated with petrochemicals processing are more likely to weather an uncertain demand and regulatory environment, panelists said today at the CERAWeek by S&P Global conference in Houston, Texas.
The refineries set to remain profitable are those that have already invested in petrochemical integration, Kuwait state-owned refiner Kipic's corporate planning manager Abdullah Al-Ossaimi said during the panel.
A spate of further challenges face the industry. More stringent emissions requirements for transportation fuels, geopolitical unrest and the pressure to invest in step with the energy transition are top of mind for Al-Ossaimi.
Kipic commissioned the final units of it 615,000 b/d Al Zour refinery in Kuwait late last year, one of the largest refinery builds in recent years after narrow margins in the pandemic-era contributed to multiple refinery closures.
The Al Zour plant has successfully tested running at maximum capacity for several weeks since late last year and is planning to test various crude slates over the next four to five months, Al-Ossaimi said.
Larger-scale refineries like Al Zour could have a greater chance of remaining profitable in an uncertain demand environment.
"The refineries that I think are going to be more successful...are larger, they're integrated and they're much more digitally enabled," Schneider Electric's senior vice president of power systems Chris Dartnell said on the panel.
The "bold electric vehicle vision" in Europe is that gasoline demand could be down 90pc by 2050, Dartnell said, but "there's another equally valid school of thought that says biofuels come and are accepted and could be rebranded as bio gasoline."
