ROMANIA

The ministry signed a contract with the International United Faust Waller company on Tuesday (November 8th) to build four refineries in the cities of Nasiriyah (output capacity of 300,000 barrels per day (bpd)), Amara (150,000 bpd), Kirkuk (150,000 bpd) and Karbala (140,000 bpd).

“These refineries will definitely meet the daily consumption of oil products in the country and after they start operating will nullify the need for imports from neighbouring countries,” said Oil Ministry spokesman Assem Jihad.

According to the contracts, the company should present the final designs for the four refineries by the first of January 2012 at the latest so work on building the foundations can begin.

“The new refineries will be constructed according to the latest international specifications and will reinforce the production capacity of Iraq of various oil products, in addition to providing employment for Iraqi capacities and manpower.”

Hameed Allawi al-Tarf, ministry adviser for production affairs, told Mawtani that work on the new refineries will go on for two and a half years. The company will be responsible for bringing in engineers and experts, while the daily labour will be performed by Iraqis.

Tarf said he expects each refinery will employ more than 2,500 permanent workers, and could possible increase the stated production capacity.

“The expected declared production of the refineries will be their normal capacity, not the maximum output, and surely this number can be increased when there is a need for it.”

Iraq’s oil policy
Hussein al-Shaherstani, deputy prime minister for energy affairs, said, “The Iraqi government’s oil policy is moving on with solid steps and progressing fast — better than the other countries of the region.”

“Iraq will very soon become an oil producing and exporting country that all countries of the world will look up to it. Iraq’s economic power will be the best weapon with which to confront the coming challenges,” he told Mawtani.

Al-Shaherstani said Iraq plans to set up refineries in all Iraqi provinces to meet the provinces’ needs for kerosene, gasoline, gasoil, household cooking gas, and auto engine oil.

He also asserted that Iraq will reach its highest oil production level of 12 million bpd by 2016.

Khalid Abdullah, a member of the Iraqi parliament oil and gas committee, said, “The four new refineries will allow Iraq to overcome its daily problems of poor supplies, and the low quality of the imported fuels, as well as the delays encountered in deliveries, in addition to absorbing a large number of experts and manpower.”

“This is a great project. I might even say that the first seeds of security improvements have sprouted as the international companies started to come to Iraq investing billions of dollars in total trust and security.”