The ceremony will take place at Repsol's Industrial Complex and will be presided over by the Prime Minister, António Costa, and will include speeches by the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Augusto Santos Silva, and the Executive President (CEO) of the Spanish energy company, Josu Jon Imaz, and the president, Antonio Brufau Niubó.
In July, the Council of Ministers approved tax incentives of up to 63 million euros to a 657 million euro project by Repsol in the Sines Industrial Complex, named as the “biggest industrial investment” of the last decade.
Repsol's investment "will not only contribute to the decarbonisation of the Portuguese economy, it will also focus on the objectives of increasing exports and reducing imports", said the Lusa agency, at the time, the Secretary of State for Internationalization, Eurico Brilhante Days.
At issue is a project of Potential National Interest (PIN) to expand the Sines Industrial Complex of the oil company Repsol, with the construction - scheduled to start this year and end in 2025 - of two new factories of polymeric materials with high added value, 100 % recyclable, for the automotive, pharmaceutical or food industries, among others.
According to the secretary of state, "it is estimated that, at a time of cruising, the direct impact of the project on the balance of trade in goods could be very close to 800 million euros."
According to the official, the project will also "extend the longevity of a very important production facility, which is the 'site' that Repsol manages in Sines", allowing it to be positioned "as a modern infrastructure in a sector that has to contribute for decarbonization, since its base is fossil fuel, it is oil”.
“It will, to a large extent, start a process that will allow Portugal, from the point of view of this industry, to have an infrastructure that has clearly taken a very significant leap in the whole of the European Union”, he stressed.
For Brilhante Dias, “more than the amount of investment – which is very relevant and, in the industrial area, is probably the largest in the last 10 years – [the project] will allow the relaunch of a very important unit and a major exporter Portuguese".
The secretary of state also pointed out the planned creation with the project of 75 new permanent jobs, to which, during the construction phase, an average of 550 jobs will be added, which could reach a peak of more than 1,000 people.
So is oil refinery a banned term now?
By Marco from Algarve on 15 Oct 2021, 07:21