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PORT HARCOURT CRUDE OIL REFINERY REOPENS – NNPC
a year ago
With the reopening of the Port Harcourt refinery, supply and demand as well inflation rates could improve in the coming months.
Port Harcourt Refinery Reopens
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation NNPC reopened its refinery in Port Harcourt Rivers state on Tuesday 26 November, 2024 after a long shutdown for repairs in 2019. The refinery is the first in the country to reopen among the four major shutdowns of the last four years. The Kaduna and Warri refineries are yet to reopen.
The 2019 closure had forced the Federal Government of Nigeria to seek crude oil refining outside the country. This had a major impact on the country’s fuel demand and supply chain. More so, on the economic stability of Nigeria as it caused immense hardship and inflation. Nigeria, one of Africa’s biggest crude oil producers, is yet to recover from the recent inflation rates and price hikes.
Since then, the country made no revenues from the out-of-service refineries. A report in 2019 showed the refinery lost 167 billion naira that year.
A $1.5 billion budget was approved by the Nigeria Federal Executive Council on Wednesday 17 March 2021 for repairs to begin at the reopened refinery.
This was argued by many who believed that the refinery was beyond repair.
Promises of reopening the refinery in December 2022 had failed and so did the ones of the first quarter of 2023.
Previous government administrations made promises to repair and make the refineries functional again, but each failed. However, starting from the date of this announcement, the NNPC said that the Port Harcourt refinery will begin pushing out products.
The NNPC also promises that with its reopening, the Port Harcourt refinery will operate at 60% capacity. It will process 600,000 barrels of crude per day.
Nigeria has struggled for years to have a proper management system for its four refineries – two in Port Harcourt, one in Kaduna and Warri respectively. The structure and improvement of refinery management in Nigeria continue to be a challenge as Dangote begins a new crude oil refining crusade in Lagos.
Repairs are expected to continue in the refineries. This is presumed from the information by the former Nigeria Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva who said that the refinery repair was divided into three phases.
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