Any party could participate in the tender, including investors from Kuwait and Saudi Arabia."Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Indonesia`s state-owned oil and gas company PT Pertamina plans to offer two refinery construction projects for international bidding, said president director Karen Agustiawan on Wednesday.
She said through the open tender, she hopes to get the lowest fiscal incentive request.
"Any party could participate in the tender, including investors from Kuwait and Saudi Arabia," she said.
She added that although the project would be offered for bidding cooperation for refinery construction with Kuwait Petroleum Corporation and Saudi Aramco Asia Company Ltd. would remain.
"It is not cancelled. But, later if the tender is opened, they may participate. It is not6 limited," she said.
Karen said the last refinery Pertamina built and operated in 1994 is located in Balongan, Indramayu, West Java.
So far the old refineries have been processing sweet crude while most of crude now are sour crude which has high sulfur content and "therefore we have been beaten in competition against foreign refineries," she said.
She hoped the development of new refineries would increase competitiveness.
Pertamina plans to build two new refineries each with a capacity of producing 300,00 barrels of oil per day and it has cooperated with KPC and Saudi Aramco for it.
The KPC has so far asked for an incentive but the finance ministry has rejected the request because it is considered too much.
KPC plans to build a new refinery in Balongan while Saudi Aramco in Tuban, East Java.
The Balongan refinery is expected to produce 9.6 million kiloliters of fuel oil while the refinery in Tuban 8.29 million kiloliters.
Besides the two new refineries the government also plans to build refineries that would be financed using the national budget.
Right now, Pertamina has six refineries that process 1.031 million barrels of crude a day.
The six refineries are located in Dumai, Riau, Sumatra with a production capacity of 170,000 barrels a day, in Plaju, South Sumatra with a capacity of 118,000 barrels a day, in Cilacap, Central Java with a capacity of 348,000 barrels a day, in Balikpapan, East Kalimantan, 260,000 barrels a day, in Balongan, West Java, with a capacity of 260,000 barrels a day and in Kasim, West Papua, with a capacity of 10,000 barrels a day.
The refineries altogether produce 40.6 million kiloliters of fuel oils per day.
(Reported by Kelik Dewanto/K007/H-YH/O001)
Editor: Priyambodo RH
Copyright © ANTARA 2013
