KARACHI: Cnergyico Refinery has been temporarily shut down till February 9
due to non-availability of crude oil to run the operations, The News learnt on Friday.
The operations of the refinery went on shut down on Thursday February 2 and would remain closed down till the arrival of the needed crude oil cargoes.
Cnergyico informed the country’s Petroleum Division about the shut down of its operations a couple of days back.
Pakistan’s oil sector has been facing the hardships in the op ening of letters of credit from the commercial banks to import cargoes of crude oil and petroleum products.
Sources in the sector said that Cnergyico also shut down its operation due to shortage of crude oil like the other refineries and oil marketing companies (OMCs).
The company’s spokesman said that the ongoing letter of credit issue and shortage of US dollars has pushed the entire oil and refinery industry in doldrums, increasing the woes of major refineries.
“The current shutdown at Cnergyico’s refinery is due to the aforementioned
circumstances and during this
time, the company will carry out maintenance work at its single point mooring (SPM).
Shutdowns taken due to maintenance work is as per norm for all refineries and Cnergyico’s refinery will be operational within 8-10 days,” he added.
Recently, Pakistan State Oil (PSO) also faced problems in importing its cargoes, when local banks refused to establish letters of credit for the state-owned oil marketing company.
The representative body of the oil sector, Oil Companies Advisory Council (OCAC) has already informed the government about the issue related to the opening of credit letters, as well as adverse impact of rupee devaluation on credit limits to import crude oil and petroleum products.
OCAC said that sudden devaluation of the rupee has inflicted losses worth billions of rupees on the oil industry, whose letters of credit are expected to be settled on the new rates whereas the related product has already been sold.
“These losses not only have an impact on the profitability of the sector, which is already under severe pressure, but also on the viability of the sector since these losses in some cases might exceed the entire year’s profit for the sector,” OCAC stated.
Pakistan’s oil sector also anticipates disruption in the lubricants supply chain, as banks have not been opening letters of credit for the import of lubricant components.
On January 31, the OCAC demanded the government to put lubricants component in the list of essential items for smooth flow of their imports.