The new asphalt unit, which is being established at the Suez Oil Processing Company (SOPC), costs EGP 138 million, Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Tarek El Molla, told Amwal Al Ghad, adding that the unit aims to increase the company’s asphalt production during 2018.

SOPC will start executing the project phases during fiscal year 2017/2018. The project will have production capacity 400,000 tons of asphalt per year, which will cover a huge part of the local market’s demands, El Molla stated.

The project is among a number of schemes processed by SOPC, Assiut Oil Refining Company (ASORC), and Petroleum Pipeline Company (PPC) within 2017/2018  in order to increase petroleum derivatives production and the quality of services related to petroleum products provided to citizens, El Molla pointed out.

PPC is also executing a project to increase the sufficiency of crude oil transmission pipelines in 2017/2018 to facilitate delivering petroleum products to Egypt’s governorates.

Meanwhile, the country is planning to increase the production capacity of refineries. As El Molla previously stated, Egypt has a national plan to develop refineries with investments worth $8 billion to cover Egyptian demands of petroleum products and to be able to re-export oil after refining.