Russia’s Tuapse oil refinery halted after Ukrainian drone attack, sources say

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MOSCOW (Reuters) – A fire triggered by a Ukrainian drone attack on Russia’s Tuapse oil refinery on the Black Sea coast has forced an emergency shut down of the refinery, two sources familiar with the matter said.

The fire at the refinery, owned by Rosneft, was extinguished, Russia’s state-run TASS news agency reported on Friday.

Russian air defenсes and the Black Sea Fleet destroyed 102 Ukrainian drones and six uncrewed boats during the night, Russia’s defence ministry said.

Rosneft did not comment on the attack.

According to one source, the drones hit the liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) production unit at Tuapse while the crude distillation unit (CDU) remained undamaged.

“There was no black smoke during the fire. That means it was just the gas (LPG) burning”, a source said.

He added, that from technical point of view, there is an option to bypass the LPG unit and restart the refinery relatively soon.

Tuapse refinery halted oil processing and output following a fire after drone attack on Jan. 25 and remained shut for about 3 months resuming operations late in April.

The Tuapse plant’s annual capacity is 12 million metric tons (240,000 barrels per day). It produces naphtha, fuel oil, vacuum gasoil and high-sulphur diesel, and supplies fuel mainly to Turkey, China, Malaysia and Singapore.

In 2023, the plant processed 9.378 million tons of crude oil, producing 3.306 million tons of gasoil and 3.123 million tons of fuel oil.