Engen Refinery back in action sooner than expected

Monday, 24 November 2008

Durban's Engen Refinery, which was temporarily shut down following a fire during the early hours of 13 November, should be back in production by mid January.

Following a detailed assessment of the damage and investigations into sourcing replacement sections for plant damaged during the fire and taking account of reconstruction time, Engen now believes the refinery could be re-started in about six weeks time.

Critical to the whole process are three large pump motor sets in the crude unit - the section where the fire occurred. The unit, built in 1992, feeds crude oil into the refinery for processing.

According to refinery GM, Willem Oosthuizen, two of the three damaged pumps have been salvaged and are being repaired. "Unfortunately the third pump and motor is beyond repair and a new one is being sourced from abroad."

He adds that while delivery of the new pump will take some time, the crude unit can comfortably operate at full capacity on two pumps and the refinery should consequently be able to restart as soon crude unit damage has been repaired, the refurbished pumps re-installed and the system thoroughly integrity tested.

The refinery closure would have been considerably longer had all three pumps been damaged beyond repair.

In the interim root cause investigations into the cause of the mechanical failure are at an advanced stage and should be completed in a about a week. This will be followed by an report based on the findings.

The refinery is also still awaiting the analysis of air samples taken on the refinery perimeter and surrounding areas during and after the fire. Once received from a specialist laboratory in Italy the findings will be handed to toxicologist, nominated by the authorities, to assess whether the fire had any impact on the health of neighbouring communities.

It is estimated that about R50 million worth of damage was caused by the fire which started at 00:20 on 13 November, as a result of a mechanical failure and was extinguished by refinery fire crews by 03:10 the same morning. No injuries were suffered during the incident.