Dangote assures of refinery’s completion by 2018

The management of Dangote Petrochemicals and Fertiliser Plant has assured that its 650,000 barrels per day (bpd) capacity petroleum refinery will come on stream by 2018.

Group Executive Director of Dangote Industries Limited, Devakumar Edwin, who is overseeing the construction of the refinery, said construction work on the projects would be completed by 2017 while refining operation would commence by 2018. “The 650,000 barrels per day capacity refinery will meet the 2018 deadline,” he said.

The 650,000BOPD Dangote Crude Oil Refinery, currently under construction, will sell its products to wholesale suppliers, not retailers, according to officials of the Dangote Industries. If the price of its gasoline is higher than the subsidized price, the buyers pay Dangote Refinery in full and then get the subsidy from government.

He said that the refinery would buy crude oil at international prices once the plant is commissioned, expectedly, in 2019. He acknowledges that there is no consensus on the volume of petrol in demand, “but whatever it is we will be able to supply it”

He is looking forward to commissioning the Three Million Tonne Per Annum (3MMTPA) Ammonia Fertiliser plant by 2018. “This is the largest single train refining plant in the world”, he gushed about the refinery project.

Three Single Point Mooring (SPM) Bouys on the Atlantic Ocean, will bring in the crude, which will be delivered to the plant through a 20km pipeline. Edwin, a chartered engineer and Indian national vested with the responsibility of overseeing all the plants in the Dangote Group, said that the refinery was designed to utilise all African crudes. One option was to reduce ourselves to Nigerian crude”, he said. But the company decided to “build in flexibility to minimise the risks,” he added.