China: After closures, Taiwan's Formosa to delay maintenance

Chemical News: China: After closures, Taiwan's Formosa to delay maintenance

https://www.chemnet.com Aug 04,2010
* Maintenance delayed to October -local paper

* Company may first reopen its No.1 cracker after fire

TAIPEI (Reuters) - Taiwan's Formosa Petrochemicals Corp said on Monday it would delay maintenance of its No.2 cracker to ensure steady production after incidents last month shut down other parts of its giant refinery complex.

The 540,000 barrel-per-day Mailiao complex in Taiwan will delay maintenance of its 1.03 million tonne-per-year (tpy) unit from Aug. 20 to a date that has yet to be decided, Formosa spokesman Lin Keh-yen told Reuters.

A local newspaper said the maintenance would most likely be pushed back to October.

That would allow Formosa Petrochemicals first to reopen its 700,000 tpy No.1 naptha cracker by September or October after a fire on July 7 [ID:nSGE66E099].

At the same time, the company would proceed with a government-ordered inspection of a residue sulphurisation unit where another fire shut down part of the complex last week.

"To find a reason for that fire takes time. It's not an easy process," Lin said. "I don't know how much time it takes."

Crackers at Asia's fifth-largest refinery complex must be shut for mandatory inspection every few years. The No. 2 cracker was supposed to be halted for a 30-40 day maintenance.

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