Nigeria poised for refining renaissance

The country is set to end a lengthy period in the doldrums with the launch of several small facilities

Nigeria remains reliant on imports to satisfy refined product demand despite being one of Africa’s top oil producers. While downstream capacity has been underutilised for a long time, the situation worsened when state-owned NNPC took its full 445,000bl/d slate offline in 2019 for long-overdue rehabilitation. At present, the 5,000bl/d modular unit developed by Nigerian independent Waltersmith Petroman at Ibigwe is the country’s only operational refinery. But with recent progress on ambitious downstream development plans, Nigeria hopes to usher in an era of fuel independence and, eventually, exports. Six new modular refineries are expected to begin commissioning within the next few months. The