Clyde Refinery

Clyde Refinery
Country Australia
Province New South Wales
City Clyde
Refinery details
Operator Shell Refining
Owner(s) Royal Dutch Shell
Commissioned 1926 (1926)
Capacity 85,000 bbl/d (13,500 m3/d)
No. of employees 330
Refining units crude units, fluid catalytic cracker, light products plants, polymerization plants, amine plants, sulfur plants, impurities treatment plants

The Clyde Refinery was a crude oil refinery located in Clyde, New South Wales, Australia. It had a refinery capacity of 85,000 barrels per day (13,500 m3/d). It was operated by Shell Refining and owned by the Royal Dutch Shell one of the largest oil and gas companies in the world.[1]

History

Built in the early 1920s, it was in operation longer than any other oil refinery in Australia.[1][2] It had been owned by Shell since 1928 and was located in Clyde where the Parramatta River and the Duck River join, 16 kilometres (9.9 mi) west of Sydney.[1]

Shell confirmed on 27 July 2011 that it would shut down refining operations at Clyde and convert the Clyde Refinery and Gore Bay Terminal into a fuel import facility by mid-2013. This was brought forward 9 months and the refinery closed in 2012, then converted into an import terminal.[3][4] This followed the initial announcement of intention pending board and employee consultation in April.[5]

The refinery was also the site of the first polypropylene (PP) plant in Australia, that was commissioned by Shell in 1970–1971 and had a capacity of 25,000 tonnes per year.[6] At the time of its closure in late 2013[7] the PP plant was owned by LyondellBasell and had an annual production capacity of 170,000 tonnes.[8]

Technical features

The refinery, which had around 330 workers, had a capacity of 85 thousand barrels per day (13.5×10^3 m3/d) and was supplied with oil from the nearby Gore Bay Terminal, also operated by Shell since its opening, located on a 10 hectares (25 acres) plot of land in Greenwich and opened in 1901. The oil transfer was made via an 19 kilometres (12 mi) underground pipeline that had a 300 millimetres (12 in) diameter.[1] The refinery processed around 4 million tonnes of crude oil annually.[1] The refinery usually supplied around 50% of the fuel consumed in New South Wales, Australia's most populous state.[9]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 "Shell Clyde Refinery & Gore Bay Terminal". Shell. 2010-09-05. Retrieved 2010-09-05.
  2. ↑ "1-Shell Australia says to shut Clyde refinery in Nov". Reuters. 2008-10-09. Retrieved 2010-09-05.
  3. ↑ "Shell to cease refining at Clyde". Shell Australia. 2011-07-27. Retrieved 2011-07-27.
  4. ↑ Clyde Russell (5 Apr 2013). "Time for Australia to decide if it wants oil refining". CNBC. Archived from the original on 6 Apr 2013.
  5. ↑ "Shell says the refinery 'can't compete'". Sydney Morning Herald. 2011-04-12. Retrieved 2011-04-12.
  6. ↑ "Global PP plant capacity". Grem-Chem. 2008-10-09. Retrieved 2010-09-05.
  7. ↑ "LyondellBasell Industries N.V. Financial Report for the year ending 31 December 2014" (PDF). LyondellBasell Industries N.V. Retrieved 23 May 2016.
  8. ↑ "Clyde Polypropylene Plant" (PDF). LyondellBasell. 2006-08-17. Retrieved 2010-09-05.
  9. ↑ "Shell to Start Clyde Refinery in 'Next Few Months'". Bloomberg. 2009-03-17. Retrieved 2010-09-05.

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