Following delays, the construction of an oil refinery plant in Preah Sihanouk province has been officially pushed back and will continue in 2021, after the facility was originally expected to start operating this year.
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Hann Khieng, chairman of the Cambodian Petrochemical Company, which is investing in the oil refinery plant, said construction has reached 20 percent since its groundbreaking in 2017 that marked the start of phase one in the construction process.
“The construction process has been slow due to weather conditions and the company has decided to upgrade the standards of the facility, so we are taking the time to design new building structures,” Mr Khieng said.
“By now, about 20 percent of the construction has been done and the first phase of the oil refinery will [now] be [in] 2021,” he added, referring to when the construction phase will resume.
The first phase of the oil refinery plant costs about $620 million that will be built over 390 hectares of land in Preah Sihanouk province.
The facility is a joint venture between the Cambodian Petrochemical Company and the Chinese-owned CNPC Northeast Refining and Chemical Engineering.
The oil refinery plant was originally set to operate in 2019, with the company bringing in oil from the Middle East to be refined until Cambodia has its own oil to send to the refinery.
No additional investment has been made on the first phase of the project despite the delays, Mr Khieng said.
However, Mr Khieng said his company had talks with representatives from Singapore-based KrisEnergy over a crude oil deal.
“We had talks with KrisEnergy, but we have not reached any agreement over the crude oil for the oil refinery plant,” Mr Khieng said.
KrisEnergy, an independent upstream oil and gas company, is overseeing development in the Apsara oil field, with the company expected to drill out the first oil drop by late of this year or next year.
Figures from the Ministry of Mines and Energy show that Cambodia consumed 2.5 million tonnes of petroleum products last year, a 10 percent increase compared to 2017. Cambodia imported the products from Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.
