Germany’s Miro Refinery to Undergo Maintenance in Autumn

The Miro refinery on the Upper Rhine is planning a partial shutdown in the autumn amid maintenance on the fluid catalytic cracker at the Werkteil 1 unit with a capacity of around 96kbpd according to people familiar with the matter.

• In 2020, the Miro refinery was supplying 25% of Germany’s gasoline, the head of the refinery said at the time.
• The refinery also uses barges to move the fuel to the region’s oil trading hub in the Rotterdam area. Recently vessels have been returning empty to Rotterdam recently, according to Riverlake Barging. That could signal that demand for the motor fuel is strong in the areas that Miro supplies, or that the plant is topping up its storage tanks before the work.
• The plant’s location on the Upper Rhine also makes it critical for diesel and heating oil supply in southern Germany, which has suffered significant disruption this summer. Germany’s Bayernoil refinery is halting wholesale deliveries of heating oil through end of July. Other refineries reported disruptions to diesel and heating oil supplies earlier this month.
• The region normally pulls diesel and heating oil from the Rotterdam area by barge. Dry weather has recently been hampering deliveries on the river.
• The crude section in Werkteil 2 will undergo an overhaul next year April/May, both people said.