The Montreal East Refinery (french: Raffinerie de Montréal-Est) was an

oil refinery An oil refinery or petroleum refinery is an industrial process plant where petroleum (crude oil) is transformed and refined into useful products such as gasoline (petrol), diesel fuel, asphalt base, fuel oils, heating oil, kerosene, lique ...

located in

Montreal East Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-pe ...

and formerly Shell Canada's largest refinery. In October 2010, refinery operations permanently ceased and the facility was subsequently converted into a storage terminal.

History

The defunct refinery, the second owned by Shell in Canada, opened on 24 March 1933. It began with three units; the distillation unit, a topping unit, and cracking catalytic unit. In 1947 it was expanded with the building of the

alkylation Alkylation is the transfer of an alkyl group from one molecule to another. The alkyl group may be transferred as an alkyl carbocation, a free radical, a carbanion, or a carbene (or their equivalents). Alkylating agents are reagents for effecting ...

and catalytic cracking refining units, and the refining capacity of was increased. From 1947 to 1960, the

isomerisation In chemistry, isomerization or isomerisation is the process in which a molecule, polyatomic ion or molecular fragment is transformed into an isomer with a different chemical structure. Enolization is an example of isomerization, as is tautomeriz ...

, catalytic reforming, chemicals plants were built and the refining capacity was further increased. During 2002 to 2008,

desulphuration Desulfurization or desulphurisation is a chemical process for the removal of sulfur from a material. This involves either the removal of sulfur from a molecule (''e.g.'' A=S → A:) or the removal of sulfur compounds from a mixture such as oil refi ...

units were built and the refining capacity was upgraded to its highest level . On January 7, 2010 Shell Canada announced closing the refinery and converting it to a fuel terminal. On June 4, 2010, following the unsuccessful attempts to find a buyer to take over the plant, Shell Canada announced its plans to move forward to downgrade the refinery into a terminal. The conversion commenced in September 2010, with it permanently ceasing operations as a refinery in October 2010. Approximately 800 jobs were lost.

Description

The refinery consisted of two refining units with capacities of and . It had alkylation, hydro-cracking, reforming catalytic, cracking catalytic, thermal catalytic, isomerisation, and desulphiration units. Its processing capacities included: * of

visbreaking A visbreaker is a processing unit in an oil refinery whose purpose is to reduce the quantity of residual oil produced in the distillation of crude oil and to increase the yield of more valuable middle distillates (heating oil and diesel) by the re ...

* of fluid

catalytic cracking Fluid Catalytic Cracking (FCC) is the conversion process used in petroleum refineries to convert the high-boiling point, high-molecular weight hydrocarbon fractions of petroleum (crude oils) into gasoline, olefinic gases, and other petroleum prod ...

* of semi-regenerative

catalytic reforming Catalytic reforming is a chemical process used to convert petroleum refinery naphthas distilled from crude oil (typically having low octane ratings) into high-octane liquid products called reformates, which are premium blending stocks for high-o ...

* of

hydrocracking In petrochemistry, petroleum geology and organic chemistry, cracking is the process whereby complex organic molecules such as kerogens or long-chain hydrocarbons are broken down into simpler molecules such as light hydrocarbons, by the breaking of ...

for distillate upgrading * of catalytic hydrotreating for cat reformer feeds * of hydrotreating for kerosene/jet desulfurization * of API Group I base oil * of unfinished wax. The refinery had 154 oil tanks and more than 450 workers. After its conversion to a storage terminal, the facility receives gasoline, diesel and aviation fuels for distribution.

References

External links

Montreal East Refinery (Shell Canada website)

Map of the refinery

Refinery Reform Campaign
{{Shell oil 1933 establishments in Quebec Industrial buildings and structures in Montreal Oil refineries in Canada Shell plc buildings and structures Montréal-Est, Quebec

History

Description

See also

References

External links