• The initial survey for the refinery was conducted in 1963. • On 9 May 1967, the foundation stone was laid for the refinery. Construction was handled by
Snamprogetti, while the facility supervision was handled by
UOP LLC. • On 12 October 1969, the refinery was commissioned. • In 1971, the
naphtha merox unit was modified to commence production of
liquefied natural gas (LNG), while
SBPS production was also commenced with existing infrastructure. The crude distiller was also modified to increase capacity from per stream day during this period. • In 1981, a
kerosene merox was installed to process A-1
jet fuel, while the energy-intensive Kerosene unifiner was decommissioned. • In 1992, the crude distiller unit was again modified to support far Eastern crude oils such as
Miri light crude oil, and Naphtha unifiner capacity was increased to 1100 tonne per day. • In 1999, platformer unit was modified to increase capacity to 650
tonne per day, to meet increasing
gasoline demand, and to phase out
lead in gasoline. • In 2003, the kerosene unifiner was modified to process
diesel, and the existing gas oil unifiner was rehabilitated to meet the
sulphur specification of 0.3
%wt in diesel. • On 19 February 2018, the entire facility was shut down for 35 days due to a planned refurbishment project. 1,200 engineers and mechanics handled the 24×7 maintenance covering the processing units, utilities, and tank farm. The production shortage during the period was covered by importing the requirements by the
Ceylon Petroleum Corporation. == Power stations ==