Dangote Refinery Capacity Now at 85%, Targets European Distribution 2025

This was disclosed by Mr Edwin Devakumar, the Vice President of Dangote Industries Limited and the head of the $20 billion refinery.

The 650,000 barrels per day Dangote oil refinery built by Nigerian billionaire, Mr Aliko Dangote, in Lagos, aims to compete with European refiners when operating at full capacity.

However, since it started operations this year, it has struggled to secure sufficient crude locally — as production remains below target and tied to contracts with other players by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited.

“We have gone up to 550,000 barrels per day, that is 85 per cent capacity in crude distillation,” Mr Devakumar said.

The refinery was forced to source crude from international markets following a dispute with the Nigerian state oil firm, the NNPC, over a crude supply deal under which Dangote Group had agreed to sell a 20 per cent stake in the refinery to NNPC for $2.76 billion

“Of this, we agreed that they will only pay $1 billion while the balance will be recovered over a period of five years through deductions on crude oil that they supply to us and from dividends due to them,” a spokesperson of the company said.

“Unfortunately, NNPCL was later unable to supply the agreed 300,000 barrels per day of crude given that they had committed a greater part of their crude cargoes to financiers with the expectation of higher production which they were unable to achieve,” the spokesperson said in a statement last Wednesday.

Dangote Refinery began processing crude in January into products, including diesel, naphtha and jet fuel and started processing petrol in September.

It still faces challenges distributing the products at home with local fuel traders and even the NNPC importing refined products.

The NNPC recently said it had restarted its 60,000 barrels per day Port Harcourt refinery.

However, there have several reports claiming that production was not as presented with the state oil firm denying such claims.

Dangote Refinery cut the price of its petrol to N899.50 per litre on Thursday from N970 “to alleviate transport costs during the holiday season.”

Business Post reports that petrol prices have relatively dropped to N935-N950 in some retail stations.