INERCO and CEPSA, partners on the new DMB marine fuel

INERCO CARRYING OUT ENGINEERING WORK AT CEPSA’S LA RÁBIDA REFINERY TO PRODUCE THE NEW DMB 0.1% MARINE FUEL

INERCO has carried out a strategic project for the CEPSA Group to produce the new marine fuel DMB 0.1% at its La Rábida refinery. The project was carried out in order to comply with the new MARPOL regulation (International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships). The regulations are applicable to all ships sailing in the Sulphur Emission Control Areas (SECAs), in the north of Europe, the United States and Canada, beginning in 2015.

INERCO’s work consisted in Detailed Engineering in the different disciplines involved in the project (processes, piping, metal structures, civil engineering, electricity and instrumentation) and purchase management for the project’s different equipment and installations, including requests for tender, technical/economic comparisons of bids and the selection of suppliers.

INERCO was commissioned for the work in mid-August 2014, with the established deadlines requiring the start-up of the facility by early December of the same year. Therefore, the time available to carry out this detailed engineering and for the suppliers to carry out the installation was slightly over three months.

The detailed engineering process also involved on-site work by INERCO professionals, who were transferred to the CEPSA facility in La Rábida during the initial phase of the project to expedite the final definition of the process and bring forward the purchase management for equipment and instruments. The detailed engineering phase involved the use of 3D design tools and techniques such as point cloud laser scanning, guaranteeing the elimination of potential interference between the new piping system and the existing installations, minimising errors and ensuring prompt completion within the project’s tight timelines.

In response to the trust placed in it by CEPSA to complete the challenge within the established timeframes, INERCO successfully completed all actions to schedule. The new installation was therefore started up on 1 December, with the sale of DMB 0.1% from CEPSA’s La Rábida refinery beginning the same month.

Through this development, CEPSA has positioned itself as one of the first international producers, and the first in Spain, to create a product specifically for compliance with the new MARPOL regulation. INERCO’s work towards this enabled the optimisation of the La Rábida refinery, resulting in it being equipped with the necessary infrastructure for the production of DMB 0.1%.