Dangote refinery not importing petroleum products – says CEO

By Abubakar Yunusa

David Bird, chief executive officer (CEO), Dangote refinery, says the refinery is only importing intermediate feedstock, not petroleum products.
Intermediate feedstock is typically crude oil or partially processed materials that can be refined into fuels such as petrol, diesel, or kerosene.
Reports had claimed that the refinery was importing petroleum products.
Speaking at a stakeholders’ meeting in Lagos on Wednesday, Bird clarified that the refinery has no interest in importing such products.
“I can guarantee you we are not importing finished products. I am a refinery. I have no interest in importing finished products, but I will be importing intermediate feedstocks and components,” he said.
Also, Bird said the refinery blends, distills, and processes a wide variety of crudes.
“Each crude is different. Each crude has different fractions. So therefore, if we’re processing different crudes, we need to be able to bring in intermediate feed stocks, so that always, we are loading up, maximising utilisation of our treatment units,” he said.
The CEO listed sone intermediate feedstock to include products like high sulfur diesel or heavy diesel, naptha, and light cycle oil (LCO).
Furthermore, Bird said the refinery is planning for a future in which it will have the opportunity “to bring in liquefied petroleum gas (LPG).”
He explained that the plant is currently building infrastructure, including a jetty, to enable it to import LPG so the refiner can fully load one of its units, maximise polypropylene production, and avoid being dependent solely on the different crude types it processes.
“Similarly, on the butane, we want to load up the alkylation unit and we’ll bring in that LPG,” Bird said.
He added that Nigeria should be incredibly proud of the public health benefits that come from having a domestic refining industry that now produces fuels to the latest global standards.
Bird said Nigeria is currently enjoying petrol with a sulfur specification of 50 parts per million (PPM), aligning the country with cleaner fuel benchmarks.