Premium News
GHANA TO IMPORT PETROLEUM PRODUCTS FROM DANGOTE REFINERY
The Ghana National Petroleum Authority (NPA) says it is considering buying petroleum products from the Dangote Petroleum Refinery once the facility is operating at full capacity.
According to Reuters, Mustapha Abdul-Hamid, chairman of NPA, Ghana, spoke on Monday at the OTL Africa Downstream Oil Conference in Lagos.
On September 3, Dangote refinery officially announced the commencement of refining crude oil.
However, the 650,000 barrel per day (bpd) capacity refinery began operations in January with the production of diesel and aviation fuel.
Abdul-Hamid said patronising Dangote refinery will help the country cut more expensive exports from Europe which cost the country about $400 million monthly.
“If the refinery reaches 650,000 bpd a day capacity, all that volume cannot be consumed by Nigeria alone, so instead of us importing as we do right now from Rotterdam, it will be much easier for us to import from Nigeria and I believe that will bring down our prices,” Hamid said.
He said importing from Nigeria rather than Europe would reduce the prices of other goods and services by removing freight costs.
Hamid also said African countries would agree on a common currency that should dampen demand for dollars.
The Association of Oil Marketing Companies (AOMCs) in Ghana had on September 11, projected a marginal reduction in petrol and diesel prices starting from September 16 — if the cedi remains stable against the dollar.
Owned by Aliko Dangote, Africa’s richest man, the refinery is expected to operate at near full capacity at the end of the year.
Meanwhile, the refinery’s residue fluid catalytic cracker, a crucial unit in the production of the fuel, is continuing to ramp up output, according to a person familiar with the matter, who asked not to be named discussing private information.
Spokespeople for Dangote didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Once fully operational, the 650,000-barrel-a-day plant will transform the regional gasoline market, potentially reducing the need for imports of the fuel from Europe to West Africa. It has already shaken up crude oil flows by trimming an overhang of Nigerian supply.
This first shipment via sea comes about one month after the new refinery began using trucks to transport petrol.
A refinery’s RFCC unit helps upgrade petroleum products into more valuable fuels like gasoline.
The Dangote Petroleum Refinery has so far received four cargoes of crude oil from the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited under the naira-for-crude sale agreement.
It was gathered that the four cargoes of crude were delivered to the refinery within the past three weeks when the government began the sale of crude to local refineries in the local currency.
Officials said that the refinery was still waiting to receive more crude oil cargoes from NNPCL, the organisation managing the country’s hydrocarbon resources.
They also confirmed that the $20bn Lekki-based plant was now
