Vietnam News Service reported that Thailand’s STFE Limited Company and Viet Nam’s Khang Thong Group, who have entered into a JV to build an oil refinery in Binh Dinh Province, will do the technical design for it together with another Thai company. They signed a contract for the purpose with PTTES Company recently.
The JV, called KST Energy Development JV Co Limited, has already signed a memorandum of understanding with the central province to build the refinery at the Nhon Hoi Economic Zone. When completed, the refinery would have an annual capacity of 6 million tonnes of petroleum products in the first phase before being doubled later. They have refused to divulge the cost but sources say it will be built on a 150 hectares site.
Mr Tran Thi Thu Ha deputy head of the Binh Dinh People’s Committee, who witnessed the signing ceremony, called on the investors to complete the work on schedule. He added that “In two weeks’ time, the investors will begin geological studies at the site. Russian and American companies had expressed interest in becoming involved with the refinery.”
KST Energy will also build a deep-sea port to serve the refinery which will import crude oil.
Viet Nam is encouraging investment in oil refineries to reduce its reliance on imports of petroleum products. The country has only one operational refinery, Dung Quat in the central Quang Ngai Province which has an annual capacity of 6.5 million tonnes.
On the same day, KST Energy and Russia’s Energoproekt Company signed a contract to perform a feasibility study for building a thermal power plant near the refinery. Work on the USD 900 million plant, which will have a capacity of 700 MW in the first phase, will begin in the second quarter of next year and wrap up in 2015.
STFE Company is a multi disciplinary engineering services company with investments in several countries. Khang Thong Group is involved in infrastructure and real estate development and has developed, among others, the USD 2 billion Happyland amusement park in Long An Province.
(Sourced from www.vietnamnews.vnanet.vn)
