NNPC seeks investors to run Nigerian refineries

Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. (NNPC) is planning to relinquish control of Nigeria’s three state-run refineries following completion of a long-planned program to rehabilitate and optimize processing capacities at the sites (OGJ Online, Sept. 30, 2019; Dec. 21, 2016).

NNPC will no longer be involved in management of the refineries after their rehabilitation, following which the services of an unidentified company will be procured to manage the plants on an operations and maintenance (O&M) basis, NNPC said in a release.

Mallam Mele Kyari, NNPC’s managing director, announced the proposed change in addressing the specific program for full rehabilitation of NNPC subsidiary Port Harcourt Refining Co. Ltd.’s (PHRC) Port Harcourt refining complex—which includes a 60,000-b/sd hydroskimming refinery and 150,000-b/sd full-conversion refinery—in Nigeria’s Rivers state.

"We are going to get an O&M contract, NNPC won't run it. We are going to get a firm that will guarantee that this plant [PHRC] would run for some time. We want to try a different model of getting this refinery to run. And we are going to apply this process for the running of the other two refineries," Kyari said.

The plan, ultimately, is to get private partners to invest in the refineries and get them to run on the same model used by Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas Ltd., where shareholders would be free to decide the future of the refineries to ensure their long-term operation, according to Kyari.

Scheduled to begin in January at PHRC’s Port Harcourt refining complex, the full rehabilitation program also will include works at NNPC subsidiaries Warri Refining & Petrochemcial Co. Ltd.’s 125,000-b/sd refinery in Delta state, and Kaduna Refining & Petrochemical Co. Ltd.’s 110,000-b/sd refinery in Kaduna state, with the entire program at all three refineries due to be completed by 2022 (OGJ Online, Dec. 19, 2019; Sept. 30, 2019).