PetroChina Demand For Venezuela Crude Up On Liaoyang Refinery

PetroChina Co. (PTR) will need to import more Venezuelan crude oil to feed its upgraded Liaoyang refinery in northern China, its parent company said Wednesday. The 180,740-barrel-per-day refinery has finished upgrading a vacuum distillation unit that will be able to process 70,290 barrels of Venezuelan high-sulfur crude per day, China National Petroleum Corp. said on its Web site. The refinery has pumped in 388,490 barrels of Venezuelan crude for a trial operation over the past month, and will increase its runs in the future, CNPC said. PetroChina's Daqing and Liaohe fields used to be the main suppliers of crude to the refinery. But declining output in the fields and growing fuel demand in the country impelled the refinery to import crude from other countries. In 2006, the refinery built a facility to process Russian crude and this year further diversified the import origins to Venezuela. Venezuela exported 5.18 million tons, or 38 million barrels, of crude to China in the first seven months of this year, up 93.8% on year.