PBF plans $1bn Delaware City refinery expansion, includes new hydrocracker
US-based refiner PBF Energy and affiliate Delaware City Refining Co. on Thursday announced a $1 billion clean fuels project, which includes the construction of a mild hydrocracker and hydrogen plant to be built at their Delaware City refinery.
The construction period will last approximately three years , and when completed, will process streams from both the Delaware City refinery and PBF’s Paulsboro, NJ refinery.
The mild hydrocracker will reduce the sulfur content by 99% in approximately 65,000 bpd of distillate production from 2,000 parts per million of sulfur to less than 15 parts per million of sulfur, resulting in a reduction of over 6,500 tpy of sulfur dioxide emissions, the companies said.
In addition, the mild hydrocracker will enable the refinery to process a heavier crude slate while producing a greater volume of clean transportation fuels with an emphasis on increasing distillate production.
This project is contingent upon timely and appropriate federal and state environmental and other permits that will not increase the cost to build or operate the project, as well as acceptable labor agreements to ensure the project can be built in an efficient and cost-effective manner, according to the companies.
The Delaware City refinery was purchased from Valero in an idled state in June 2010 and successfully restarted in October 2011. The Paulsboro refinery was purchased in December 2010.
It is estimated that the PBF clean fuels project will require over 1,000,000 of local man hours of labor to complete. It will also add approximately 50 jobs to the labor force at the Delaware City refinery.
Upon completion, the combination of the Delaware City and Paulsboro refineries will be the premier refining complex on the eastern seaboard, the companies said.
Thomas D. O’Malley, PBF’s chairman, said: “The PBF clean fuels project will ensure the long-term survivability of the Delaware City and Paulsboro refineries in good markets and bad. It has always been our intention to make Delaware City and Paulsboro world-class refineries, which will certainly be the case with this project.”
The Delaware City refinery is a high-conversion heavy crude oil refinery with a processing capacity of 190,000 bpd.
Major process units include a fluid coking unit, a fluid catalytic cracking unit, a hydrocracking unit with a hydrogen plant, a continuous catalytic reformer, two alkylation units, and several hydrotreating units.
The refinery's production is sold in the US Northeast via pipeline, barge, and truck distribution.
Paulsboro is a high‐conversion heavy crude oil refinery with a processing capacity of 170,000 bpd.
Major process units include a delayed coking unit, a fluid catalytic cracking unit, hydrotreating units, a reformer, an alkylation unit, and 12,000 bpd of lube oil processing capacity.
Paulsboro is located approximately 35 miles from the Delaware City refinery.
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