Marine fuel drives ExxonMobil European refinery investment

A substantial investment in a Norway refinery following reduction in allowed sulphur content in marine fuel

ExxonMobil gave the go-ahead for a substantial investment at its Slagen, Norway, refinery in September, just two months after it said it would spend more than $1 billion at its Antwerp, Belgium, facility. Behind both investments is the sharp reduction, taking effect in January next year, in the allowed sulphur content of marine fuel oil used in the world’s control areas. The company is to construct a residue flash-tower - a vacuum distillation unit - at Slagen to extract vacuum gasoil from the refinery’s heavy fuel oil stream. The vacuum gasoil will in turn be upgraded into road diesel or marine fuels, while the remaining heavy fuel oil will be sent to the existing Visbreaker for upgrading i