Lack of steel delays take-off date of Dangote refinery project

By Dapo Olawuni

Though the multi billion dollars Dangote Crude Oil Refinery was expected to kickstart production activities in year 2020, fresh facts have emerged that the refinery would not be completed until year 2021 due to some bottlenecks in steel importation.

The Group Executive Director, Dangote Group, Mr. Devakumar Edwin, disclosed this in an interview with Reuters, adding that the firm could start using the refinery’s tank farms as a depot to warm up operations despite the delays at the congested Apapa and Tin Can Island ports.

“We will be able to complete the refinery project by the end of next year – mechanical completion,” Edwin said.

He said the crude unit for the refinery, which set sail from China last month, would arrive by the end of October.

According to him, “the tanks will be connected to five single point mooring buoys” (SPMs), which will allow the refinery complex to pump crude straight into tanks from large ships at sea and pump products back out onto boats of any size.”

The GMD noted that the team was in talks with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), two other international oil companies and two large oil traders, who were all interested in supplying crude and buying products.

Meanwhile, as part of the company’s trading plan, Edwin said it was setting up its own trading desk, with a senior team of three people and a staff of roughly 30 who would be monitoring international commodity prices.

Also, the Chief Operating Officer, Dangote Refinery and Petrochemicals, Mr. Giuseppe Surace, said the SPMs would be the primary method of supplying oil products from the refinery.

He added that the team was considering using the tanks as training or as a depot before the refinery’s production starts.

“We might do that. We will be ready to do that,” he said, though he added that no decision had been taken yet.”

The refinery which is being built at a large expanse of land at the Lekki Free Trade Zone in Lagos will become the biggest refinery in the whole of Africa.

The facility has been viewed by many industry players and stakeholders as a game-changer for the African oil and gas industry, and will transform Nigeria from being a net importer of petroleum products to a net exporter.