(Adds background)
HOUSTON, March 15 (Reuters) - Royal Dutch Shell Plc
began restarting the large crude distillation unit (CDU) and
coker at its 318,000 barrel-per-day (bpd) Deer Park, Texas,
refinery, said sources familiar with plant operations on Monday.
The 270,000-bpd DU-2 CDU and 92,000-bpd coker are the first
units to begin restarting since both of the refinery's CDUs were
shut by a pump seal failure on Feb. 14, the sources said.
Shell spokesman Curtis Smith declined to comment.
After DU-2 and the 70,000-bpd DU-1 CDU come back online,
Shell plans to restart the other units at the refinery
throughout the week, sources have told Reuters.
The Deer Park refinery is a 50-50 joint-venture between
Shell and Mexico's national oil company, Pemex. Shell
is the managing partner.
(Reporting by Erwin Seba; Editing by Franklin Paul and Jonathan
Oatis)