Happy Birthday for
Hyundai Oilbank

Oil refinery celebrates 43rd anniversary and to invest $3.6 bln to expand facilities

Hyundai Oilbank, the nation's oldest oil refinery celebrated its 43rd anniversary July 1 at its Seoul office in downtown Seoul on June 29. The annual event gathered some 300 officials and staff of the oil company and cooperative firms and presented awards to those with exemplary work records and put in extended years of continuous work with the company and to cooperative firms with outstanding services for the company. The event also reaffirmed the successful implementation of the company's long-term strategy,"Vision 2012"declared in March and also held a blood donation session in the spirit of sharing love with neighbors.
President Seo Young-tae said both men and business firms have to have a vision for growth and development and Hyundai Oilbank has Vision 2012, which can only be achieved with trust and challenging reform.
Hyundai Oilbank Co. has decided to invest 2.1 trillion won by 2011 to expand its oil upgrading facilities,
the company announced on June 1.
The company said the project got the approval from its board of directors meeting held in Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates on May 29.
When the project is completed in 2011, the oil refinery will add 52,000 barrels of light oil more to its daily production of oil products, which currently stands at 64,000 barrels per day.
The upgrading facilities produce light oil such as gasoline, diesel and kerosene from bunker-C oil, a low-priced heavy residual oil.
The company already has secured 300,000 pyeong of land in Daesan Local Industrial Complex near its Daesan oil refinery complex in Daesan, South Chungcheong Province. Construction will start this year, the company said, adding that the project will contribute to the local economy as well as save foreign exchange for the country.
Khadam Al Qubais, in charge of investment at the IPIC, the majority shareholder of the oil company, said the upgrading project got the final approval from the board and so it will proceed as planned.
He added that the oilbank will have the largest upgrading facilities in Korea when the project is completed. It will also help increase the company's profit from oil refining and marketing.
The upgrading facilities turn high sulfur heavy oil to low sulfur heavy oil and extract light oil from low sulfur heavy oil, to make an oil refinery to produce more light oil from crude oil.
The expansion of the upgrading facilities is designed to meet the rising demand for light oil and the hikes in crude oil prices in a bid to cope with the changing environment of the International oil market, which will also help the country in general.
The project will also help reduce the import cost of crude oil because it will use cheap heavy residual oil with high sulfur contents and produce bunker-C oil whose demand is falling and extract light oil from the cheap oil.
The oil refinery will also invest $1.1 billion to build BTX production facilities. The investment will be shared 50-50 by major shareholders of the company,
Hyundai companies and the IPIC's affiliate CEPSA, a Spanish oil company owned by IPIC. In May, Hyundai Oilbank and CEPSA signed an MOU to build BTX plant capable of turning out 600,000 tons of BTX a year.
The project will also help the economy of the coastal region by creating additional jobs and balanced development of the country, the oil company said.
Hyundai Oilbank has grown from its foundation in 1964 as the first privately-owned oil company in Korea-Kukdong Oil Industrial Co., into one of the leading Oil Refining and Marketing companies in Asia.
The company's business lines are made of petroleum refining, and marketing and the production of petrochemicals, including paraxylene, and benzene. The company's Daesan Refinery located on the central west coast of South Korea has a production capacity of 390,000 barrels per day with storage facilities for 5.3 million barrels of crude oil and approximately 7 million barrels of petroleum products. In 1997, the oil refinery built an aromatic plant with a production capacity of 300,000 tons of benzene. In 2003, the company's annual sales totaled 4,740 billion won with an average daily throughput of 310,000 barrels. The company now has approximately 16 percent of the domestic light oil market with a network of 2,200 gas service stations across the country.
To support the network, the company owns and operates 13 oil storage stations with a total capacity of over 2.8 million barrels and 9 distribution terminals in key areas across the country. nw

President Seo Young-tae of Hyundai Oilbank

A view of the ceremony to mark the 43rd anniversary of Hyundai Oilbank