Samruk Kazyna wants private investors to pay for power plant in Atyrau

According to Nurlan Zhakupov, CEO of the Samruk Kazyna Fund, a gas turbine power plant (GTPP) for the needs of the Atyrau Oil Refinery (ANPZ) will be built at the expense of private investments.

«We are starting to build a power plant to ensure the energy independence of the Atyrau refinery. If we attract private investment, it will be faster,» Zhakupov wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

The first news about the construction of a power plant for the Atyrau refinery appeared in June. The refinery’s head Murat Dosmuratov was the first to speak about the project publicly. At the time, he said that the GTPP will guarantee that power to a new part of the facility is delivered smoothly. It should reduce the risk of power failure when the refinery is forced to burn products on its flare units. The new power station with a capacity of 154 megawatts is expected to start operating in 2028.

A month after Dosmuratov’s announcement of the new project, the Atyrau Refinery was hit by a blackout due to a failure at the Mangystau Nuclear Power Plant (MAEC). The incident was caused by excess pressure in the plant’s units that led to a fire. As a result, the cycle at the refinery was completely stopped for several hours. The ANPZ was able to restore its operation on July 6, three days after the failure.

The Atyrau refinery is one of the three biggest oil refineries in Kazakhstan, along with refineries in Shymkent and Pavlodar. It was built in 1945 based on technology by the American company Badger and Sons. Currently, it produces about 5.5 million tons of oil products per year. The sole owner of the refinery is the KazMunayGas national oil company, with in turn is controlled by Samruk Kazyna (87.4%) and the National Bank of Kazakhstan (9.6%). In 2022, the oil company went public. As a result, its shares are traded on KASE, AIX and SPB Exchange (Russia).