The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) announced on Tuesday, March 14, that approximately $32.6 billion investment is required to overhaul refineries, pipelines and critical downstream infrastructure.
According to a report by The Guardian, the Group Executive Director of NNPC Limited Downstream, Adeyemi Adetunji, made the announcement at a conference in Cape Town, South Africa, organized by the African Refiners and Distributors Association (ARDA).
Adetunji revealed plans to co-locate an African Refinery around the Port Harcourt Refinery and a condensate refinery, with a combined capacity of NNPC-related refineries hitting 1.27 million barrels per day of crude processing.
In March 2021, President Muhammadu Buhari’s government approved $1.5 billion for the overhaul of the Port Harcourt oil refinery, which NNPC later awarded to Italy’s Tecnimont., with Adetunji assuring participants at the conference that the overhaul of the refinery is in top gear and would be ready in the second quarter of the year.
The Nigerian government recently awarded a contract for the overhaul of the Kaduna refinery to Daewoo Engineering Nigeria Limited, with Adetunji highlighting the need to improve refining capacity in Africa along with growing demand.
“We are on a journey of renewal and growth. The plan is to revive the existing refineries, make them functional and grow our supply capacity,” he added.
The NNPC also acquired a 20% stake in Dangote’s oil refinery for $2.76 billion, during the Warri Refinery, with installed capacities of 125,000 bbl/d under rehabilitation.
Adetunji called for regionally connected pipelines and depot networks as a starter for refinery investment in Africa and a pan-African connected network. Nigeria has spent over N10 trillion on subsidizing premium motor spirit due to lacking local refining capacity.
Earlier at the conference, Executive Secretary of the African Refiners & Distribution Association, Anibor Kragha, cited the rehabilitation of storage and distribution facilities as key to scaling up energy security in Nigeria and Africa at large. “Storage and distribution infrastructure, including pipeline and storage, should be a focus. We cannot have a dialogue about refineries without storage,” Kragha said.
Source:
https://guardian.ng/business-services/nnpcl-seeks-32-61-billion-to-overhaul-refineries-pipeline-infrastructure/