NNPCL In A Make Or Mar Crude Supply Target To Dangote Refinery 

The much awaited grand opening of the Dangote Refinery takes place next week and the supply of about 300,000 barrels of crude oil per day by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) to the facility is going to commence, the Group Chief Executive Officer, NNPCL, Mele Kyari, announced on Thursday.

During the ongoing 4th Nigerian Oil and Gas Opportunity Fair in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, disclosed this while urging all stakeholders to join the national oil company in growing crude oil and gas production in Nigeria. 

He said the NNPCL, which had 20 per cent stake in the refinery, was ready to meet its crude supply obligations to the facility, stressing that with the coming on stream of the refinery next week, the national oil company “will be supplying 300,000 barrels of crude oil per day to Dangote.”

“We want to address the energy challenges so that industrialisation can come to the country. 48 per cent of all revenue that comes to the government comes from the oil and gas sector and we are in a very good position to support the growth of the economy”, he said.

Early this month, it was reported that the Dangote Refinery, established by Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, is scheduled to be inaugurated on May 22.

A presidential aide, Bashir Ahmad, had said that the inauguration would be done by the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.).

“Efforts by the Federal Government to make Nigeria self-sufficient in local refining of crude oil to save the scarce foreign exchange used in the importation of petroleum products have received a boost as the 650,000 barrels per day Dangote Refinery, the world’s largest single-train refinery, is set for inauguration on May 22nd, 2023, by President Muhammadu Buhari,” Ahmad announced.

The 650,000bpd facility, estimated to worth over $19bn, is an integrated refinery project under construction in the Lekki Free Zone, Lagos, Nigeria.

It is expected to be Africa’s biggest oil refinery and the world’s biggest single-train facility. 

The company, on its website, said the refinery would meet 100 per cent of the Nigerian requirement of all refined products and also have a surplus of each of these products for export.

“Dangote Petroleum Refinery is a multi-billion dollar project that will create a market for $21bn per annum of Nigerian crude.

"It is designed to process Nigerian crude with the ability to also process other crude,” the firm stated. 

The announcement of the planned inauguration of the facility on May 22 had also elicited excitement and expectations among Nigerians, industry operators, government officials and other stakeholders.

“We are optimistic and excited to know that the refinery is set for the inauguration, considering the humongous benefits that it is going to have on not just the oil sector, but on the Nigerian economy,” the National Public Relations Officer, Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria, Chief Ukadike Chinedu, had stated.

“With the coming on board of the Dangote Refinery, we believe that Nigeria will say goodbye to PMS scarcity, as well as the poor supply of other petroleum products,” Ukadike stated.

Conclusion

Given the perrenial fuel availability issues in Nigeria at targeted seasons of the year and what seems like poor handling of the challenges, one begins to wonder how Nigeria's crude oil supply dynamics will play out with the onboarding of Dangote Refinery.

It is true that, all things being equal, the entry of the Dangote Refinery will ease the existing market forces.

However, an overiding question is, if the NNPCL can sustain a regular supply of 300,000 barrels of crude to the Dangote Refinery, has it been doing the same for the existing refineries all these years of fuel crises in Nigeria?

Questions like this serve to let Nigerians understand more and should not be misconstrued.