Nippon Oil Corp, Japan’s biggest refiner, restarted a 140,000 barrel-per-day crude distillation unit (CDU) at its Mizushima refinery in western Japan, a company source said.

The CDU was shut down on September 28 due to a technical problem. Before the shut down, the unit had briefly restarted after the completion of regular maintenance that began on September 1.
Nippon Oil Corp also said it had shut two secondary units at its Sendai refinery in northern Japan after a fire and cut runs for other units.
   A 60,000 barrel-per-day (bpd) vacuum distillation unit and a 35,000-bpd gas oil vacuum desulphurisation unit were shut as a result of the fire, a spokesman said.
Other units, including the refinery’s 145,000-bpd crude distillation units (CDU), are operating at lower capacity, he said. He declined to specify the reduction in the run rate.
The cause of the fire is still under investigation.