SOCAR and Axens, France signed an agreement on construction of diesel fuel and gasoline hydrotreating unit in the territory of Heydar Aliyev Baku Oil Refinery.

SOCAR President Rovnag Abdullayev, representatives of the company management, Axens’ Chief Executive Officer Jean Sentenac, Sale Manager Fabien Lundy and representatives of French Embassy in Baku attended the signing ceremony. In his welcoming speech, SOCAR President Rovnag Abdullayev said reconstruction and modernization work would enable the refinery to increase its annual refining capacity and produce high-quality Euro 5 oil products. It is necessary to renovate the primary crude oil processing, catalyst cracker, catalytic reforming plants and to construct new installations, including bitumen plant, diesel fuel hydrotreating, hydrogen production and amine treating units, LPG MEROX, gasoline hydrotreating unit.

Within the work toward Process Design Package preparation, Axens was chosen as a licenser of diesel fuel and gasoline hydrotreating unit construction. Formerly Axens was involved in the construction of STAR refinery’s hydrotreating units in Turkey. Axens CEO Jean Sentenac said they were proud of this partnership and thanked for being chosen as a licenser.

About Socar

SOCAR is an integrated state oil & gas company of Republic of Azerbaijan and is involved in upstream, midstream and downstream operations encompassing exploration of oil and gas fields, production, processing and transporting oil, gas and condensate, marketing of petroleum and petrochemical products in domestic and international markets and supplying natural gas to domestic and industrial customers in Azerbaijan. SOCAR has its trading companies in Switzerland, Singapore and UAE and representative offices in a number of other countries.

About Axens

Axens, an IFP Group affiliate, is an international provider of advanced technologies, catalysts, adsorbents and services, with a global reputation for basic engineering design excellence. The main scope of Axens' business is focused on the conversion of oil, coal, natural gas and biomass to clean fuels as well as production and purification of major petrochemical intermediates. Axens’ global offer is based on: highly trained human resources, modern production facilities and extensive commercial feedback from plants using our processes and catalysts all around the world.