Aktau / Pavlodar, 23 October. The CASPI BITUM plant in Aktau and the Pavlodar Petrochemical Plant (PNHZ), both part of the KazMunayGas group, will stop producing BND 100/130 road bitumen from 1 November 2026 and switch to grades selected for the climate: BND 70/100 for the northern and central regions and BND 50/70 for the southern ones; the decision was taken on the government's instructions, KMG's press service said.
Bitumen is the viscous black residue of oil refining that binds crushed stone and sand in asphalt concrete. Its hardness determines how the pavement behaves in heat and frost. The grade is marked BND, the Russian abbreviation for petroleum road bitumen, followed by two numbers: the permissible depth to which a standard needle under a 100 g load penetrates the bitumen in 5 seconds at 25 °C, in tenths of a millimetre. This indicator is called penetration: the smaller the numbers, the harder the bitumen. The needle enters BND 50/70 by 5.1–7 mm, BND 70/100 by 7.1–10 mm, and the discontinued BND 100/130 by 10.1–13 mm. In other words, instead of one grade, the softest of the three, the plants will produce two harder ones: the hardest for the hot south and the intermediate one for the north and centre.
CASPI BITUM is a joint venture of KMG and China's CITIC Group, each holding 50%. The plant processes oil from the Karazhanbas field in Mangistau region. In May 2025 a 36.1bn tenge modernisation was completed: oil processing rose from 1m to 1.5m tonnes a year and bitumen output from 500,000 to 750,000 tonnes; the general contractor was CITIC Construction. Karazhanbas is developed by another KMG–CITIC joint venture, Karazhanbasmunai JSC, which produced 1.018m tonnes of oil in the first half of 2026.
PNHZ is a refinery in Pavlodar wholly owned by KMG; besides bitumen it produces petrol, diesel and jet fuel, liquefied gas, sulphur and petroleum coke. Bitumen is made at a bitumen production unit commissioned in 1979, consisting of a fuel oil vacuum distillation block and a bitumen block, with a design capacity of 500,000 tonnes. In January 2024 a new furnace was launched at the unit, which, according to the regional akimat, raised output by 15% to 52,000 tonnes a month.
According to KMG, the two plants together cover the country's demand for road bitumen, estimated at 1.2m tonnes a year. The Agency for Protection and Development of Competition, however, pointed out a high concentration of state participation in this market: in 2025 PNHZ and CASPI BITUM together produced about 70% of road bitumen.
From now on the grade of bitumen depends on whether the road lies in the south or the north.
What it means: The two plants that produce most of the country's road bitumen are dropping one universal soft grade and switching to two designed for the climate: the hardest for the south and the intermediate one for the north and centre.
Who benefits: Road builders and drivers, if climate-specific grades improve the pavement; KMG does not estimate this effect. For the plants it is a government decision rather than a market one: both already supply most of domestic demand.
Background: Before CASPI BITUM's modernisation, KMG put the two plants' combined bitumen capacity at 800,000–850,000 tonnes a year and expected in 2022 to meet 67% of domestic demand.
List of sources used: KMG, Zakon.kz, Ak Zhaiyk, PNHZ, Kazakhstanskaya Pravda, Kapital.kz
Artificial intelligence was used in preparing this material.
