Chinese National Petrol Corporation (CNPC) could build the fourth oil refinery in Kazakhstan, correspondent LS quoted General Director of Oil Kazenergy Aset Magauov as saying in Astana on Friday.
“I think CNPC will build the fourth oil refinery, because it is better represented at the Kazakhstan market, than CITIC or Sinopec,” he added.
Magauov added that the government has created the working group led by Energy Minister Vladimir Shkolnik concerning funding of construction of the fourth oil refinery by the Chinese side. “The approaches and location of the oil refinery are now under discussion.”
There are options in Western Kazakhstan and Central Kazakhstan. Until the working group finishes its work, we will not have counteroffers for the Chinese side. We must tell them as the Kazakhstan side what will the oil refinery capacity should be, its location and what kind of raw material it should be oriented to. After that we could talk about cost of the oil refinery,” he explained.
In parallel we need to work on the issues of the markets. Magauov said that at present Kazakhstan is short of 2 million tons of oil products for local consumption. “If we are going to build a big oil refinery, we need to understand where we are going to export the difference. We need to think if it is going to be Central Asia or the Transcaucasus. This issue demands careful work, because there is an economic interest in construction of a big oil refinery on the one hand and on the other hands, there are risks,” he concluded.
