Transforming the industry to design the refinery of the future

Owing to our commitment to innovation, we boast pioneering refining assets in terms of technology. which makes them more efficient, safe, and sustainable. At Repsol, we're transforming our complexes into multi-energy hubs capable of manufacturing products with a low, neutral, or even a negative carbon footprint as well as promoting new business models based on digitalization and technology.

Innovation and sustainability: The keys to maintaining our leadership position

The Industrial business will reduce its emissions by more than 2 million tons of CO₂ by 2025. That's why we are promoting various leading industrial projects, such as:

• the construction of the first advanced bi-fuel plant, at the Cartagena refinery, with a production capacity of 250,000 tons of biodiesel and biojet from waste every year, and in which we are going to invest 188 million euros.
• The development of one of the world's largest synthetic fuel pilot plants and another for biogas in the Basque Country.
• Other projects to boost the production of renewable hydrogen and the use of electricity from renewable sources. 

Renewable and low-emission hydrogen play an important role in industry, and are essential to make progress towards decarbonization. In this sense, Repsol aspires to be a leader in renewable hydrogen on the Iberian Peninsula, with an equivalent production of 552 MW by 2030.

The crude oil obtained from wells around the world travels to our Industrial Complexes by sea or in pipelines. After it has arrived, it is analyzed and sent to different areas of the refinery for processing. 

The first stage in processing crude oil consists in physically separating the hydrocarbons found in the oil according to their boiling point. Then, the crude oil is fed into a distillation column where it is heated at high temperatures. Later, the lighter components, such as gases, rise to the top of the column while the heavier ones, such as lubricants and bitumens, stay at the bottom. Even though we tend to think of gasoline or diesel, there's a lot more we can obtain from crude oil. Tires, asphalts, plastics, containers, and numerous other products have one thing in common: they all came out of an oil barrel.

Look at the following infographic to learn about the process in detail.