Historic Moment As Dangote Refinery Begins Production

The Dangote Refinery has started production. The largest single-train refinery in the world located in Lekki, Nigeria, began operations in the early hours of Friday.

This followed the delivery of six million barrels of crude supply in batches of one million barrels each starting December 2023.

It is a significant step for the refinery – and for Nigeria at large – as it begins operations which should ultimately help Africa’s largest oil producer achieve self-sufficiency in petroleum products and save foreign exchange expended on importation of finished products from abroad.

Designed for 100 per cent Nigerian crude with the flexibility to process other crudes, the 650,000 barrels per day Dangote Petroleum Refinery can process most African crude grades as well as Middle Eastern Arab Light and even US Light tight oil as well as crude from other countries.

Dangote Refinery has the capacity to meet 100 percent of Nigeria’s requirement of all refined products, gasoline, diesel, kerosene, and aviation jet, and also has a surplus of each of these products for export.

The refinery was built to take crude through its two SPMs located 25 kilometres from the shore and to discharge petroleum products through three separate SPMs. In addition, the refinery can load 2,900 trucks a day at its truck-loading gantries.

Dangote Refinery has a self-sufficient marine facility with the ability to handle the largest vessel globally available. In addition, all products from the refinery will conform to Euro V specifications.

The refinery is designed to comply with US EPA, European emission norms, and Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) emission/effluent norms as well as African Refiners and Distribution Association (ARDA) standards.

While receiving the first consignment, President of Dangote Group, Mr. Aliko Dangote, had stated: “We are delighted to have reached this significant milestone. This is an important achievement for our country as it demonstrates our ability to develop and deliver large capital projects. Our focus over the coming months is to ramp up the refinery to its full capacity. I look forward to the next significant milestone when we deliver the first batch of products to the Nigerian market.”i

The world’s largest single-train Rlrefinery, the 650,000 barrel-per-day Dangote refinery is set to be a game changer for Nigeria’s economy when fully operational by helping end the country’s reliance on fuel imports.

It will start with the production of diesel and aviation fuel before moving on to petrol.

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