Parkland Fuel’s Burnaby refinery to expand renewables coprocessing

Calgary-based Parkland Fuel Corp. is expanding coprocessing of Canadian-sourced canola and tallow biofeedstocks with conventional crude oil in 2021 by nearly 125% from 2020 at subsidiary Parkland Refining (B.C.) Ltd.’s 55,000-b/d refinery on Burrard Inlet in North Burnaby, near North Vancouver, BC.

Following low-capital investments and work completed during its 2020 turnaround to enable coprocessing of about 44 million l. of canola and tallow biofeedstocks from Canadian sources by yearend, the Burnaby refinery plans to increase coprocessed volumes to 100 million l. during 2021 to deliver customers low-carbon fuel options that include diesel containing up to 15% renewable content, the operator said late on Feb. 17.

Parkland Fuels said it expects the annual environmental benefit of increased low-carbon fuel at the site in 2021 will be the equivalent of removing 80,000 passenger vehicles off the road, in line with the company’s commitment to a reduced-carbon future for Canada.

“Our [Burnaby] refinery is focused on delivering the essential fuels our customers depend on, but with lower carbon intensity,” said Ryan Krogmeier, Parkland Fuels’ senior vice-president of supply, trading, refining, and health, safety and environment.

“In addition to providing our British Columbia customers with low-carbon gasoline, diesel and jet fuel, we are growing a competitive advantage that will win new business and drive organic growth,” Krogmeier added.

Resulting coprocessed low-carbon fuels from the refinery—which increased nearly 140% during 2020 vs. 2019—currently contain less than one-eighth the carbon intensity of conventional fuels, the company said.

Started in early February 2020 and completed in April 2020, the $60-million (Can.) 2020 major turnaround at Burnaby was to include works focused on the refinery’s crude unit, fluid catalytic cracker, and sulfur recovery unit, as well as preventative work on several other unidentified units (OGJ Online, Apr. 6, 2020).

The turnaround also was to involve “proactive upgrades” to refinery safety systems and unidentified preliminary works to advance the site’s “green refining” capabilities.

Refinery overview

The Burnaby refinery processes light and synthetic Canadian crudes such as Edmonton Par 80% and Syncrude 20% into gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, asphalt, heating fuel, heavy fuel oil, butane, and propane for distribution throughout British Columbia.

Parkland Fuel purchased the Burnaby refinery—which was the first in Canada to use existing infrastructure and equipment to coprocess biofeedstocks such as canola oil and oil derived from animal fats (tallow) alongside crude oil to produce low-carbon fuels— and related downstream assets from Chevron Canada Ltd. in 2017 (OGJ Online, Apr. 20, 2017).