The country's largest refiner SK Corp said on Thursday it was planning to raise November throughput to 99 per cent of capacity or close to 810,000 barrels-per-day, compared to 94.3 per cent in October, to take advantage of winter demand. Traditionally, demand for oil products rises in the winter owing to the need for heating fuels.

"The temperature is decreasing so there will be more demand for heating oil," an official said.

SK Corp, who is also the single largest refinery in the world, has a nameplate of 810,000 bpd, but has in the past run above that, to a high of 860,000 bpd.

LG Caltex refinery also plans to increase its November rates but only marginally from October.

"We were running around 93-95 per cent in October. For November I think we will run at full capacity, but it may between 95 to 100 per cent," an officialsaid.

LG Caltex has a capacity of 650,000 bpd.

November runs at Hyundai Oil Refinery Co would be steady from October, at around 360,000 bpd, an official said.

Hyundai has a nameplate capacity of 310,000 bpd, but is able to run at a maximum of 380,000 bpd following a revamp of its crude distillation unit in September.

A recent rally in products prices as north-east Asia entered its traditionally strongest demand period in the fourth quarter has helped improve refining margins in Asia and prompted refiners to ramp up runs in October.

"The refining margins are not that great, but are better compared to a couple of months ago," a South Korean refiner said.

But Hanwha Energy will continue to run well below full production capacity, hindered by problems securing crude, industry sources said.

An official at the cash-strapped company said that it was only running its 200,000 bpd complex at 95,000 bpd, which would continue into November, due to Financial difficulties in purchasing crudes.

"We wouldlike to increase our rates, but we had a problem getting a credit line and it is hard to resume this credit line," the official said.

The latest official figures -- covering July -- showed that the sector's run rate averaged 84.65 per cent of production capacity.