Industrial conglomerate Formosa Plastics Group (FPG, 台塑集團) has resumed production at some units of its petrochemical complex in Yunlin County, which were shut down by a power failure earlier yesterday.
FPG said it expected all affected units to come back online later in the day after it completed safety inspections on these sites, according to a statement released yesterday.
The incident occurred when Tropical Storm Talim was approaching Taiwan and causing heavy rain, but the news of the shutdown did not impact the share prices of the group’s four core companies.
The Yunlin petrochemical complex in Mailiao Township (麥寮), comprising the offshore Mailiao and Haifong industrial compounds, houses an oil refinery with annual capacity of 25 million tonnes of crude oil and three naphtha crackers, which produce 2.94 million tonnes of ethylene per year.
The complex also includes other petrochemical plants, heavy machinery plants, a co-generation power plant and the Mailiao Industrial Harbor.
The group said in the statement that “some plants in the Mailiao compound and all factories in the Haifong compound” had been shut down after a power outage that occurred at about 11:55am.
An investigation into the cause of the outagefound it was caused by malfunctions of the double busbar circuit system at the petrochemical complex’s public utility area.
A total of 54 out of the complex’s 66 units were shut down, but the group said most of these units were expected to be restarted after separating the failed circuit and repairing the public utility system, according to the statement.
The group did not disclose the potential damage from the temporary shutdown to these units operated by its core members — Formosa Plastics Corp (台塑), Nan Ya Plastics Corp (南亞塑膠), Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) and Formosa Chemicals & Fibre Corp (台灣化纖).
Shares of Formosa Plastics Corp, the group’s flagship company, rose 0.88 percent to NT$80.1 and Nan Ya Plastics, the nation’s largest plastics maker, increased 1.42 percent to NT$57.3 yesterday.
Formosa Petrochemical, the nation’s second-largest refiner, moved up 1.09 percent to NT$83.7, while Formosa Chemicals & Fibre, which produces aromatics and styrenics, advanced 1.26 percent to NT$80.2.
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