The Sapugaskanda Oil Refinery will be temporarily closed from today (15) due to a shortage of crude oil. This is the first time in the history of the country that the Sapugaskanda oil refinery will be closed due to lack of crude oil.
The President of the Petroleum General Employees Union Ashoka Ranwala has stated that the reason for the closure of the refinery is the lack of crude oil and a ship carrying crude oil is scheduled to arrive in the third week of December and the Sapugaskanda refinery has to be closed until then.
“For the first time in history the refinery will be shut down tomorrow. The refinery will be closed tomorrow not because of the lack of crude oil in the world. There is enough crude oil. Regular orders are for diesel and petrol only. According to the Minister, petrol is available till January. The Minister should say whether diesel will come after this month. No ship has arrived since October 5th. As a result, the refinery ran for three months at 3,500 metric tons per day. That’s less than 50%. Call me back to the CID if you want. But what was said was true. Kerosene production stops. No orders received. Have to go for emergency purchases. However, the fuel price formula will come in two months. Convener of the Petroleum Trade Union Confederation Ananda Palitha says that in the future fuel will have to be distributed on a ration and queue basis.
Meanwhile, Minister of Energy Udaya Gammanpila and Chairman of the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation Sumith Wijesinghe have stated that a special media briefing will be held this afternoon (15) to make an official statement in this regard.
This was stated by the Chairman of the Ceylon Petroleum Storage Terminal, Mohamed Uwais.
“There are rumors that the Sapugaskanda oil refinery will be closed from tomorrow. This is due to the fact that the crude oil suppliers did not participate in our tenders. We can say responsibly that we will ensure that refined oil is brought to Sri Lanka instead of crude oil and distributed without any shortage. ”
It is said that 90,000 metric tons of crude oil from the crude oil tanker, which will arrive in December, will be enough for only 15 days and will be available again in mid-January.