Total Port Arthur, Texas, refinery to restart FCCU next week -sources

HOUSTON, Oct 7 (Reuters) – TotalEnergies SE (TTEF.PA) plans to begin restarting the gasoline-producing fluidic catalytic cracker unit (FCCU) at its 225,500 barrel-per-day (bpd) Port Arthur, Texas, refinery by Oct. 14, said sources familiar with plant operations on Thursday.

TotalEnergies did not reply to a request for comment.

The 76,000-bpd FCCU shut down on Sept. 9 because of a boiler leak, forcing a shutdown of the entire refinery due to the loss of steam supply from the FCCU, the sources said.

Late last week, Total restarted the 40,000-bpd ACU-2 crude distillation unit (CDU) and its attached 51,000-bpd vacuum distillation unit-1 (VDU-1), according to the sources. Both units shut down on Sept. 9.

ACU-2 is the smaller of two CDUs at the refinery. The 150,000-bpd ACU-1 CDU and its attached 60,000-bpd VDU-2 as well as the 60,000-bpd coker are remaining shut for a planned overhaul scheduled to last about two months, the sources said.

CDUs do the initial breakdown of crude oil into feedstocks for all other units at the refinery. VDUs refine at vacuum pressure residual crude from the CDUs, which operate at atmospheric pressure.

Cokers convert residual crude from distillation units into either motor fuel feedstocks or petroleum coke, a coal substitute.

Reporting by Erwin Seba; Editing by Leslie Adler and Christopher Cushing

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