By Kekeboro Ebiere
The Dangote Petroleum Refinery in Lagos is currently undergoing a modification process to upgrade its capacity from 650,000 barrels per day to 700,000 barrels per day.
The upgrade, which is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of this year, will add another 50,000 barrels per day to the facility’s nameplate capacity.
According to Alhaji Aliko Dangote, President of the Dangote Group, the modification process is necessary to scale up the oil refinery.
“Our RFCC is at 85 per cent. We are not up to 100 per cent because there are some modifications that we are doing. It will finish by the end of the year, and we believe we will get to 700,000 bpd, not even 650,000, because all the other components that we have and all the other departments have all (reached 100 per cent),” Dangote said.
The refinery has been buying crude oil from the United States, with Dangote disclosing that the company bought 19 million barrels of crude between June and July this year.
“As a company, we bought 10 million barrels of crude this month. So, 10 million barrels this month means that at the capacity we are, it’s about 55 per cent coming from the US,” he said.
Dangote also spoke about the challenges of building a refinery, saying that if he had known the difficulties involved, he wouldn’t have started the project.
“People believe building a refinery is like building a house, but, like what I keep saying, if I knew what we were going to face, I wouldn’t have started it at all. So, the luck that we’ve had now as a group was because we didn’t know what we were getting into, really, and we believe that nothing is impossible,” he said.
Dangote noted that as the project got deeper, the group was faced with whether to stop and sink or continue and succeed. “So, we have to push and continue to make sure that we deliver,” he said.
He said a refinery in Africa became expedient because many countries on the continent relied on fuel imports. “Apart from Algeria and Libya, which are self-sufficient in Africa, technically, everybody is an importer,” he said
Dangote said he was unapologetic in saying that some foreign actors were attacking all industries through importation.
“If you go to Lome, you will see a massive number of ships. That’s what they do to attack all the industries in sub-Saharan Africa. Even if you look at the refineries in South Africa, they are actually not operating. Only one is now operating in South Africa, but we were able to take this risk,” he Added
The Dangote Refinery is a significant investment in Nigeria’s energy sector, and its completion is expected to make a major impact on the country’s economy.