Starting in the middle of this month, South Africa’s Sasol and its Natref joint venture partner Total will restart their Sasolburg refinery. The plant will be fully operational again by the end of June.
Because of low demand arising from South Africa's Covid-19 lockdown measures, Natref halted the refinery on 9 April. It will restart in a phased manner and the plant's load will increase in response to demand, with most products available toward the end of the start-up sequence.
A start-up at Astron Energy's 110,000 b/d Cape Town refinery is less certain. Astron started a major turnaround there in mid-February that was meant to last for two months. The South African Petroleum Association (Sapia) expected the refinery to come back online in the beginning of July, but Astron was unwilling to specify a date because it said the pandemic's effect is too unpredictable.
The government has designated Cape Town a Covid-19 hotspot, and the city could be returned to a stricter alert level again at any time if the spread of infection is not contained and health facilities are at risk of being overwhelmed.
