ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Postal Services on Monday issued a commemorative postage stamp of Rs 20 on the completion of 100 years of successful operations of Attock Refinery Limited (ARL). ARL, a pioneer of crude oil refining in this part of the world is a member of the Attock Group of Companies, the only fully integrated group covering all segments of Oil and gas industry from exploration, production and refining to marketing of petroleum products, besides being also engaged in power generation, manufacturing and trading of cement and other entrepreneurial activities.

Following discovery of oil by Attock Oil Company in 1915, ARL started in 1922 with two small stills of 2500 barrels per day (bpd). ARL continued its journey and in late thirties and early forties the refining capacity was enhanced to 10,000 bpd.

In 1981 with addition of two distillation units the capacity increased to 30,000 bpd. In 1999, refinery was further up-graded with addition of a 10,000 bpsd heavy crude unit, a reformer unit to improve motor gasoline quality and a captive power plant.

In 2016, ARL completed a major expansion and up-gradation project comprising diesel hydrodesulphurization (DHDS) unit (to reduce sulphur contents in high speed diesel to meet Euro specifications), pre-flash unit (to enhance refining capacity by 10,400 bpd), Isomerization Unit (to enhance production of Premium Motor Gasoline by about 70%) and expansion of existing Captive Power Plant by 18MW. The refining capacity now stands at 53,400 bpd with improved specifications of products. ARL is now gearing up to undertake another major upgradation project to meet Euro-V specifications.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022