Minister of Environment and Energy Tomislav Ćorić met on Wednesday with a delegation of union representatives at INA regarding the future of the company, particularly the workers of the Sisak refinery, after which the president of the Oil Industry Union Jasna Pipunić expressed satisfaction with the responses about the process of selecting a strategic partner and the Government’s stance on supporting INA as a vertically integrated oil company.
The fate of 40 employees at the FCC facility of the Sisak refinery will not be in question, and all of them will be offered suitable alternative jobs, while those who do not wish to accept them will be offered severance pay, Ćorić stated to reporters after the meeting.
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Union representatives say that this facility significantly contributes to the operation of the Sisak refinery, so if that is true, these are moments that require additional consultations, Ćorić said.
In response to a question about the selection of advisors for the repurchase of INA from MOL, Ćorić stated that they will be selected in the next two to three weeks, certainly by the end of March.
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Pipunić reported that the Government supports investments in the Rijeka refinery and that the Sisak refinery will operate until the completion of that process. Regarding the workers from the FCC facility, she said that it is a business decision and announced that a meeting with the director of the Sisak refinery will be held again on Friday.
Workers will have jobs
We have data on how many free jobs exist in Sisak and in the logistics sector in Rijeka, so these workers will have jobs. On Friday, we expect more concrete data; we were told that the secondary facilities will operate continuously, so we do not expect that any of those 40 workers will be laid off, Pipunić added.
We were told that in the Sisak refinery, after the shutdown of the FCC facility, gasoline will no longer be processed but rather diesel fuel, but the unions do not accept the shutdown of the facility as it results in job losses, Pipunić conveyed.
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According to the business decision, gasoline will be processed in the Rijeka refinery, which has a more modern and better facility, while diesel and some other by-products will be processed in Sisak. The unions will consider the situation and hold a meeting on Monday to inform the membership and make decisions, she announced.
Coordinator of the Defense Headquarters for the Sisak refinery Predrag Sekulić reiterated that the shutdown of the FCC facility means a step towards closing the refinery. If the Government does not take a firmer stance towards MOL, what we have been warning about for four years will happen, Sekulić said.
– We are seeking a meeting with experts and not only proving that the Sisak refinery operates positively, but also offering new solutions. If this decision is implemented, we have made it very clear that the margin of the Sisak refinery will be negative, specifically minus 20 dollars per ton, he stated.
They want to shut down the FCC facility, which generates a net profit of 10.5 million kuna in 28 days, with the aim of later showing that the Sisak refinery is unprofitable, and then the Rijeka refinery could also come into question, Sekulić claims.
INA: The FCC facility in the Sisak Oil Refinery is not an independent entity
The company INA warned about the incorrect approach of treating the FCC facility in the Sisak Oil Refinery as an independent entity, emphasizing that its shutdown does not mean the closing of the refinery, but rather the optimization of refinery operations to improve the company’s results.
– The approach of treating the FCC facility in the Sisak Oil Refinery as an independent entity is inaccurate. As we have already emphasized, we cannot isolate the operation of the Sisak FCC facility in relation to the entire refinery because this facility is not a separate unit in the process, just as we cannot view the Sisak Oil Refinery independently from INA’s refinery system, which also includes the Rijeka Oil Refinery, states INA’s announcement.
Furthermore, it is highlighted that processing the same raw material in Rijeka can generate 14 million kuna more compared to processing in the Sisak FCC facility.
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– Processing in Sisak only increases the share of gasoline and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) which we have in surplus, while processing in Rijeka would primarily produce diesel, a product that is most consumed in INA’s key markets and whose import INA could consequently reduce, INA explains.
The processing of crude oil in Sisak will continue in blocks, while the secondary facilities will operate without interruptions, which has not been the case until now, they note.
In a statement sent to Hina after the meeting of Minister of Environment and Energy Tomislav Ćorić on Wednesday with a delegation of union representatives at INA regarding the future of the company, INA emphasizes that the cessation of operations of the FCC facility in the Sisak Refinery does not mean its closure.
As they point out, this is INA’s business decision based on market demand and the comparative advantages of both refineries, and its goal is to optimize refinery operations to improve the company’s results.
Namely, as shown by INA’s financial report for 2017, the Sisak Oil Refinery is not profitable and generated an operational loss of 207 million kuna and a negative cash flow of 125 million kuna last year. The proposed mode of operation is a step towards significantly reducing these losses.
