The Olmeca refinery, Pemex’s recently activated crude oil processing plant in the southern state of Tabasco, won third place in the megaproject category at the 2025 International Project Excellence Award granted by the International Project Management Association (IPMA).
The award, presented on Friday in Berlin, Germany, places the Pemex (Petróleos Mexicanos) project among the most outstanding worldwide.
The Olmeca refinery, also known as Las Bocas for its location at the Port of Las Bocas in the southern Gulf Coast municipality of Paraíso, competed with more than 150 large-scale projects from around the world and was recognized for its best practices in planning, technological innovation, and execution capacity.
The first two places went to the French company Alstom for the Wanda Zhonghe Shulin Line project, and the Chinese company CNOOC for the Daxie Petrochemical Refining project.
Pemex said IPMA’s recognition underscores the refinery’s importance as a strategic project for Mexico’s energy sovereignty.
Some of the fuel produced by the Olmeca refinery includes Pemex Magna gasoline, Pemex Premium gasoline, ultra-low sulfur diesel (ULSD), eco-friendly diesel (EDE), coke, sulfur, LP gas and propylene.
According to Pemex, Olmeca is the only refinery in Mexico that produces eco-friendly diesel, supplying the Yucatán Peninsula and strategic projects like the Maya Train.
However, since going online in August 2024, Olmeca has yet to reach its processing capacity of 340,000 barrels per day across 17 state-of-the-art processing plants. According to Pemex, the refinery processed 156,200 barrels of crude oil per day during July, down 18.4% compared to the previous month.
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Production is expected to gradually increase to 158,000 barrels of gasoline per day and 122,000 barrels of diesel per day, strengthening the country’s fuel market.
Olmeca was one of former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s flagship projects, officially inaugurated on July 1, 2022. The more than two-year delay in starting operations has been blamed on technical problems, poor performance and environmental roadblocks.
The project was controversial from the start, and seen by many as a symbol of López Obrador’s reluctance to embrace clean and renewable energy sources. But Olmeca came in for its heaviest criticism when huge overruns more than doubled its cost to US $20 billion from the budgeted US $8 billion. According to the Mexican Institute of Chemical Engineers (IMIQ), that figure makes it one of the most expensive refineries in the world.
With reports from El Financiero, La Jornada, El País and Energy and Commerce
