The oil refinery in Bosanski Brod in Bosnia and Herzegovina, just across the border from the town of Slavonski Brod in Croatia, which is a significant air polluter due to its obsolete technology, stopped its production on January 9. The management of the loss-making and Russian-owned refinery said that the overhaul works could last at least a year, reports Jutarnji List on January 31, 2019.
According to Petar Đokić, the minister of energy and mining of Republika Srpska, one of two entities comprising Bosnia and Herzegovina, it is uncertain when the production at the refinery will resume since it is unclear why the production has been suspended. The refinery management just announced that this year, due to the overhaul, there would not be primary processing and that the refinery would not import crude oil. Its buyers will be supplied through the Serbian oil company NIS.
“The refinery probably has its own reasons for the long overhaul. Perhaps there are some organisational factors or market conditions which are the reasons for the delay in production. It is not uncommon for large companies to supply each other from plants which are the cheapest and the most profitable. Large corporations are trying to maximise their profits by optimising all production capacities. If one comes to the conclusion that it is not worthwhile to produce something on their own, but rather to buy it from someone else, that is a legitimate and normal decision in the market economy,” said Viktor Simončić, an independent environmental expert.
In the past eleven years ago, when the Russian owners of the refinery restarted the production, citizens of the neighbouring Slavonski Brod in Croatia have been having problems with polluted air. Will the people of Brod finally be able to breath more easily?
“As far as the refinery is concerned, the citizens of Slavonski Brod will breathe a little cleaner air, but it will not be completely clean until the problem of home furnaces and transportation is resolved. According to my rough estimate, except in some rare extreme situations, about 90 per cent of air pollution in Slavonski Brod is coming from local home furnaces and transport. These pollutants have nothing to do with the refinery,” said Simončić, challenging the widely-held assumption that it is the refinery which is causing health problems for people on both sides of the border.
Translated from Poslovni.hr.
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