Essar Oil Ltd, a subsidiary of Essar Energy, on Thursday announced the successful commissioning of a new isomerisation unit at its Vadinar refinery in Jamnagar district of Gujarat.

The 0.7-million tonnes per annum (mtpa) unit is a key component of the phase-I expansion of the company's Vadinar refinery that will increase its capacity from the existing 14 mtpa to 18 mtpa (or 300,000 barrels per day to 375,000 bpd), the company said in a release here.

Among the largest such units in the world, its commissioning was completed in just 32 days (as against an industry average of 50-55 days), without compromising on safety, said Mr Naresh Nayyar, CEO, Essar Energy.

This unit is the first expansion unit to be fully commissioned. Using naphtha as its primary feed, the Vadinar refinery's isomerisation unit will help produce Euro IV grade gasoline of high octane rating and almost zero sulphur content.

The Vadinar refinery's expansion project is nearing completion. Increased refinery throughput of 18 mtpa will commence in the first quarter of 2012.

When completed, the phase-I expansion will also increase the Vadinar refinery's complexity from 6.1 to 11.8. An optimisation project is also under execution at the refinery to further increase the capacity to 20 mtpa (405,000 bpd) by September 2012.

The capacity expansion, complexity enhancement and subsequent optimisation will give the Vadinar refinery the capability to process nearly 87 per cent ultra-heavy crudes, which are lower cost than light crudes.

In terms of product yield, the expanded Vadinar refinery will have the flexibility to produce higher value products, including pet coke.

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