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Oil, Gas & Mining vocabulary · Refining & Petrochemicals

Refinery

Meaning in oil, gas & mining, with examples

/rɪˈfaɪnəri/nounCore term

In oil, gas & mining, refinery means: An industrial plant where crude oil is heated, separated and chemically changed to make products such as gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, LPG and asphalt.

In Turkish: rafineri

How it is used

Refineries are described by their capacity in barrels per day and by their complexity. Staff talk about refinery units, turnarounds (planned maintenance shutdowns), throughput and refining margins. A refinery 'processes' or 'runs' crude.

Example sentences

  1. The refinery processes about 200,000 barrels of crude a day.

  2. Two units at the refinery will be shut down for a six-week turnaround.

Common collocations

  • oil refinery
  • refinery capacity
  • refinery turnaround
  • refining margin
  • distillationThe first main step in refining: crude oil is heated, and its vapours rise in a tall column and condense at different heights into fractions such as gasoline, kerosene and diesel.
  • crackingA refining process that breaks large, heavy hydrocarbon molecules into smaller, lighter ones, turning low-value heavy oil into more gasoline, diesel and other products.
  • feedstockThe raw material fed into a refinery unit or chemical plant to be processed, for example crude oil for a refinery or naphtha for a petrochemical plant.
  • downstreamDescribing the last stage of the oil and gas business: refining crude oil, then distributing and selling fuels and other products to customers.
  • crude oilOil in its natural state as it comes out of the ground, before it is refined into fuels such as gasoline, diesel and jet fuel.

More terms: Refining & Petrochemicals

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