Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources Tarek El Molla has conducted an inspection visit to a number of strategic petroleum projects in Suez in order to follow up on their progress, the ministry said in a statement.

During his visit, El Molla affirmed the importance of such vital projects to develop the production units which will help turn Egypt into a regional hub for the petroleum and natural gas trade as well as meet the domestic market needs for high-quality petroleum products.

The Minister has inspected the new asphalt project designed by Petrojet and Enppi companies with a production capacity of 1,200 tons per day with investments worth around EPG 970 million. El Molla also visited the project of establishing three asphalt warehouses with a production capacity of 900 cubic meters and an asphalt shipping platform which costs EGP 139 million. El Molla highlighted that this initiative will help meet 50% of the needs of the national road building project and reduce imports.

In addition, he also monitored the progress of the modernization of the wax distillation warehouses at a capacity of 7,500 cubic meters to increase diesel production.

During the tour, Suez Oil Processing Company’s (SOPC) Chairman Hesham Fathy explained the executive situation of some projects, including the Coking and Diesel Production Complex, with a cost of EGP 28.6 billion, and the installation of salt separators for distillation units with investments of EGP 600 million, in addition to other environmental projects.