• CEO says 1.4mbpd expansion plan feasible in three years
Dangote Refinery has achieved 50 million litres of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), also known as petrol, daily, supported by a 24-hour loading operation that moves over 1,000 trucks each day.

This was the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), David Bird, said the company could deliver a 1.4 million-barrel-a-day expansion of the plant within three years, betting on a replication strategy designed to avoid the cost overruns and delays that often plague large energy projects.

Speaking on the refinery’s operations and plans, Bird said the refinery’s around-the-clock operations would ensure that high production is matched by efficient distribution, reinforcing supply stability across the country.

He added that the scale of logistics involved in achieving these outputs, operating 24 hours a day to meet domestic demand, marks a significant improvement in fuel distribution efficiency and had been instrumental in eliminating the fuel scarcity that previously plagued Nigerian cities, particularly during the festive seasons.

“So, we have been easily able to achieve over 1,000 trucks of offtake. So it’s not just the production, it’s also the offtake that has achieved that 50 million litres a day,” he said. “This is not just a crude single processing plant. We have built a flexible, resilient production process where we can make finished products from crude, intermediates, or blending components.”

Bird emphasised that even during planned maintenance, the refinery had continued to meet domestic fuel demand, highlighting the facility’s operational flexibility.

The $20 billion refinery’s capacity to deliver 50 million litres per day has been made possible by its modern design, which Bird described as a “merchant refining, blending and trading platform.”

Speaking about the expansion plan targeted for 2026 yesterday, Bird said the refinery will pursue what he described as a “roofless replication” of its existing configuration, essentially copying the current design without reopening detailed engineering work.

That approach, he said, would allow the company to fast-track procurement and construction by relying on proven specifications rather than redesigning systems.

“Once you let engineers go back into an expansion, they often start to tinker, and that sends you back into months or years of detailed engineering,” Bird said. “The idea here is replication. We will not need to reengineer, so we can get straight into ordering long-lead items and commencing construction.”

The Dangote Refinery, located in the Lekki Free Trade Zone (FTZ) near Lagos, is already the largest single-train refinery in the world, with a nameplate capacity of 650,000 barrels a day.

An expansion to 1.4 million barrels per day would cement its position as one of the world’s biggest refining complexes and significantly reshape fuel flows in Africa, a region that has long relied on imports for refined petroleum products.

Bird, who was appointed as the refinery’s first standalone CEO, said the expansion timetable rests on two sets of parallel activities beginning immediately.

The MD debunked claims by industry players that the N739 petrol price was “anti-competitive”.

While addressing the media, Head of Communications for the Dangote Group, Anthony Chiejina, noted that the ongoing crisis in Venezuela benefits the country.

On petrochemicals, Bird said polypropylene production is central to the refinery’s strategy.

He added that future diversification could include detergents, base oils, lubricants, and Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), driven by import substitution and population demand.

Asked on the crude-for-naira programme, Bird said between 30 and 40 per cent of the refinery’s crude supply comes from the scheme, adding that the refinery would continue to engage the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) and the government to improve crude allocations and volumes.