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President Shavkat Mirziyoyev has been briefed on plans to transform the Bukhara Oil Refinery into a significantly larger and cleaner-fuel producer, with two staged investment projects totalling roughly $2.1 billion on the table and construction of the bigger scheme pencilled in to begin as early as 2028.
The refinery, which came online in 1997 and employs more than 3,200 people, has a design capacity of 2.5 million tonnes of crude oil and gas condensate a year. It produces motor petrol, diesel fuel, aviation kerosene and other petroleum products. In the first nine months of this year the plant processed more than 1.5 million tonnes of feedstock and produced close to 1.5 million tonnes of finished products, generating a net profit of 2.2 trillion soums. By year-end, management plans to push raw-material throughput to 2.17 million tonnes and finished-product output to 2.12 million tonnes.
A $328 million step toward Euro-5 petrol
The first project, valued at $328 million, would establish production of AI-92 and AI-95 grade motor petrol meeting Euro-5 environmental standards — grades the refinery does not currently manufacture at scale. The scheme involves upgrading existing process units and building new production facilities, with the goal of reaching annual output of 1.1 million tonnes of Euro-5 petrol once complete.
Backers of the project say it would also cut spending on imported fuel additives by up to $150 million a year and create 200 new jobs. Commissioning is targeted for the second quarter of 2029.
A larger overhaul with four countries’ technology firms
The second and more ambitious project carries a preliminary price tag of $1.8 billion and would introduce modern refining and petrochemical technologies alongside entirely new process units. If realised, total annual petroleum product output at the refinery would rise from the current roughly 2.1 million tonnes to 4.6 million tonnes.
Within that expanded output, motor petrol production would reach 2.7 million tonnes a year, diesel fuel 1.24 million tonnes and aviation kerosene 500,000 tonnes. The project also envisages producing benzene and other petrochemical products, deepening the conversion of feedstock and generating higher added value from each tonne processed.
Technology partners from China, France, the United States and Azerbaijan are expected to be involved. Construction is planned to start in 2028, though no financing arrangements were disclosed in the briefing materials reviewed by the president.
Strategic context
The Bukhara refinery is one of Uzbekistan’s two principal oil-processing facilities and sits at the centre of the country’s fuel supply chain. The Euro-5 upgrade addresses a longstanding gap: Uzbekistan currently imports fuel additives to meet quality requirements for modern vehicle fleets, and domestic production of compliant petrol grades would reduce that import dependence. The larger expansion, if completed, would make the plant one of the more substantial refining operations in Central Asia by throughput.
The presentation to Mirziyoyev covered the economic efficiency of both projects, the deployment of modern technologies, full utilisation of production capacity and the broadening of high-quality, competitive petroleum product output, according to the briefing summary.