* Says Refinery Fitted with 150 days PMS stock
*”We used Indigenous technical know-how to build this refinery”
By Ojima-Ojo Abubakar
The Vice-President, Dangote Refinery Limited, Mr. Devakumar Edwin has classified the refinery as strategic national asset for the country.
Mr. Edwin who made the statement during a tour of the oil facility located at the Lekki Free Trade Zone in Lagos, by editors of several media organizations across Nigeria, added that it has a strategic reserve of 150 days Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) stock.
He noted that aside being the second largest employer of labour in Nigeria after the government, the company has created indigenous petroleum engineers, contributes immensely to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and gradually transforming Nigeria into the leading global player in the oil services sector.
He explained that with the innovative ideas of Aliko Dangote, President of the Dangote Group, who does not believe that “anything is impossible,” they have created not just the largest refinery in the country, but a key player in the production of fertilizer across the world.
Edwin said: “We have here at the Refinery we have here at the refinery, 150 days national stock of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS). In case of diesel (AGO), we have more than 150 days stock, for Aviation fuel, we have much more. So what we have in this facility is a strategic national reserve.
“Before we set up this largest single train, the global petroleum refinery has 430,000 barrels per day in the Middle East. But, what we set up here is 50% larger than the hitherto largest refinery.
“In fact, the biggest thing we are more proud of is that a Nigerian company built it. If you go all across the world, to US, to Europe, to Asia, their refineries were built by Shell or Chevron or Exxon Mobil or Total, Bechtel from US, Siphon from Italy, Technip from France, JGC from Japan, Chiyoda, these six companies are the ones who have practically built all the refineries in the world.
“But when it came to our company, we went and talked to the three of them, they all said, okay, you are talking about 650,000 barrels. The capital cost will be roughly $30,000 a barrel, which means 30,000 into 650,000 is about 19 and a half billion dollars.
“So it’s 20 billion dollar investment. You will need to pay us 15% fees, which is $3 billion. And so my President said, no, let’s go and build it ourselves. We told him, you see companies like ExxonMobil, Shell, Total, Chevron they have never tried it. And you want us to do this? It’s almost impossible.
“Then he said, Edwin, have you forgotten? You know he has a plaque on his table which says ‘nothing is impossible’. Have you forgotten what I keep on my table? So he said, nothing is impossible. Let’s just go and do it.
“And that is how we built this refinery. Dangote Projects limited built this refinery. Nigerian can be proud of that.
“A Nigerian company attempted and built the world’s largest single train refinery. And now we can see the value addition which is creating in.
“The Dangote Refinery has become a game changer for Nigeria and its economy. The refinery has helpped stabilized the nation’s economy.
“You can see we are exporting our jet fuel primarily to Europe. Our gasoline has gone to us, our diesel is going to Europe. So it’s not only consistent supply of fuel but also high quality fuel.
“And then if you see the prices of fuel last year after the subsidy was removed, it was going up, stabilized at a level.
“You can go and check at what price it was selling and at what price it is selling today. I have been in Nigeria for 34 years. I have not seen even the price of stationary paper or a pure water coming down.
“And we have seen for the first-time fuel prices coming down. So we have not added value only in terms of quality and consistency of supply, but in terms of pricing.
“And, you can see the global impact of the price of the refinery. You can see how the currency values have been stable or sometimes even becoming stronger because instead of importing huge quantities of finished petroleum products, now you are having locally available products and we are also exporting products. So, we are also generating foreign, foreign exchange. So there is a net benefit to the country.
“This is a huge forex outflow. Now there is inflow and also outflow is reduced. In fact, if we continue to go in this direction strongly, the currency will even continue to become better. So, the refinery has been able to contribute in a large way”.
Aside being in oil and gas, the factory also has constructed a huge 300 million metric tonnes per annum Urea (fertilizer) plant and is currently developing additional 600 million metric tonnes plant beside the existing plant envisaging that nobody will feed feed Nigeria in due course in spite of population growth.
“What this means,” he said, “is that more Nigerians can go into commercial farming with available fertilizer at affordable price.
Equally speaking while taking the editors round the project site l, Engr. Osunsakin Adelani, a pioneer engineer at the plant, said the current gantry at Dangote Refinery can load 707 trucks of PMS within an hour.
“We have global best laboratories where everything we do here, at every stage of the production, are first tested for quality control before the completion of production is completed. And we have the capacity to monitor every single live feed from every point in the refinery”.
He also said that the refinery is standing on 75 per cent swamp.l, of which 65 million cubic meters of sand was pumped from the Atlantic Ocean to reclaim the land to natural settlement.
“We did surveys which made us drive 250,000 pauch and colon of 62 meters, importing crude oil from Nigeria, US, Angola, and other countries that have the type of crude we require,’ and these because, Nigeria is not producing enough crude to satisfy the refinery’s need.
To overcome the high cost of constructing the refinery from the so-called global best refinery construction engineering firms, “we set up a construction company to construct the roads here and to construct the refinery,” he added.
