Essar Oil Ltd will shut its refinery in western India for three weeks from July 18 to help ramp up its capacity to 210,000 barrels per day (bpd), said a company spokesman.
The refinery at Vadinar in Gujarat state is currently operating at 150,000 bpd. "Essar oil is in the process of integrating its secondary units and this is a planned shutdown," the spokesman told Reuters. The refinery is expected to operate at its full capacity from October this year as the units will require some time to stabilize, he said.
The units include a fluid catalytic cracker with an annual capacity of three million tones, a diesel hydro desulphurization unit of 3.7 million tones, a 3.2 million tones per year ammonia recovery unit and two sulphur recovery units, each with a daily capacity of 220 tones.
Essar’s refinery is the second such project by a private firm in India’s state-dominated oil sector. Top private company Reliance Industries Ltd runs a 660,000-bpd unit, also in western India.
Shares in the Essar Oil were down 0.4 per cent at Rs 57.45 in a firm Mumbai market that rose 1.3%.

(The Economic Times)