Dangote's 650,000-bpd oil refinery being built in Nigeria is due to begin production by the 4Q of 2022, reported Reuters with reference to Group Executive, Devakumar Edwin.
"75% hydraulic testing ... as well as 70% of electrical cable fitting have been completed preparatory to the completion of the refinery in the fourth quarter of this year," Edwin said during a site tour with Nigeria's Information Minister Lai Mohammed.
The refinery, being built at a cost of USD19 B in Lagos, has 4.74 B liters storage capacity, Edwin said. He added that 75% of products will be moved by sea within Nigeria.
Africa's richest man Aliko Dangote said in January he expected his oil refinery project to begin production by the end of the 3Q and reach full capacity by early 2023.
The project has been delayed by several years and the cost has shot to USD19 B from Dangote's earlier estimates of USD12 B to USD14 B.
Dangote, who built his fortune in the cement industry, first announced the intention to build a refinery in 2013, with the project expected to be finished in 2016.
The billionaire then moved the site to Lekki in Lagos, upgraded the size and said production would start in early 2020.
Despite being Africa's biggest oil producer and exporter, Nigeria depends almost entirely on fuel imports after allowing its significant refining capacity of 445,000 bpd to become dilapidated over several decades.
As MRC wrote previously, in August, 2021, gunmen killed a police officer and six employees of a Nigerian oil and gas services contractor during an attack on buses transporting workers to a Shell project site in the southeastern state of Imo. Attacks on oil and gas facilities have long been a problem in Nigeria, where the multi-billion dollar industry sits alongside impoverished communities that have seen little benefit from it. In this case, the motive was unclear.
We remind that Royal Dutch Shell plans to reduce its refining and chemicals portfolio by more than half, it said in July 2020 without giving a precise timeframe. The move is part of the Anglo-Dutch company's plan to shrink its oil and gas business and expand its renewables and power division to reduce greenhouse gas emissions sharply by 2050.
Ethylene and propylene are the main feedstocks for the production of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), respectively.
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,487,450 tonnes in 2021, up by 13% year on year. Shipments of all grades of ethylene polymers increased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market totalled 1,494.280 tonnes, up by 21% year on year. Deliveries of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased, whreas.shipments of PP random copolymers decreased significantly.
MRC