PBF Energy recently acquired the Martinez refinery on an 860-acre site in the City of Martinez, California, about 30 miles northeast of San Francisco. This dual-cooking facility has a capacity of 157,000 barrels per day and is one of the most complex refineries in the USA. Meanwhile, its strategic location in Northern California allows for operational synergies with another company’s Torrance refinery in Southern California. Apart from the refining assets, the deal also covered various top-notch logistics assets on-site, such as a deep-water marine facility, product distribution terminals, and refinery crude and product storage facilities, with a total shell capacity of around 8.8 million barrels. PBF views the purchase of the Martinez refinery as a significant strategic move in expanding its operations on the West Coast. When working on this energy project, VEC’s biggest challenge was ensuring the proper performance of all mech systems, despite the enormous size and the facility’s age.
VEC’s tech specialists were crucial to the PBF Martinez Refinery project in 2021-22. Our team provided world-class mechanical and plumbing BIM & VDC services in that case. They involved constructability review & routing optimization, prefabrication planning, 3D mechanical modeling & coordination, and shop & installation drawings development. To guarantee the best possible efficiency, we cooperated closely with Shultz, a well-known construction service provider to oil refiners in California, and Martinez Refining Company as the client. At the same time, our critical goal was to meet the installers’ needs during the design process. Therefore, we created valid constructability markups and delivered robust routing optimizations, which were essential for developing feasible models and drawings. Also, we helped the client save resources during the construction phase by providing plans for prefabrication, which was among the key pros VEC offered.
