Petroleum Refineries: There may not be enough crude oil for local production – Minister

Nigeria’s Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Oil), Heineken Lokpobiri, has allayed fears that there may not be enough crude oil for local refining when Portharcourt, Kaduna, Warri, Dangote and BUA refineries start working.

Lokpobiri stated that the refineries and other Modular Refineries will not get enough crude oil for local refining, if there was no commensurate increase in crude oil production.

After fixing faulty refineries, the Minister asserted, it will be embarrassing for the lack of crude oil to feed them as well as private oil refineries that belong to Dangote and BUA.

The Minister expressed the fear publicly for the third time in the last four months at the 2024 sector retreat for the ministry, held yesterday in Abuja with the theme: “Building Synergy for Enhanced Development in the Oil and Gas Sector” according to Daily Trust.

The retreat was said to have been convened to discuss how to achieve the targets and mandates set for the ministry by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu at the ministerial retreat held in November, 2023.

“The first target is to see how we can ramp up production, and then we can meet our target in terms of increase in revenue, meet our obligation in the mid-stream and upstream.

“One of the challenges I am afraid of is, if we finish fixing our refineries, we will be unable to get feed stocks. It will be very embarrassing that we finish Port Harcourt, Kaduna, Warri and Dangote and BUA and we don’t have feed stocks.”

Lokpobiri had first raised the issue in November, 2023, while responding to the questions asked by the State House correspondents at the end of the three-day retreat at the Presidential Villa.

Nigeria’s Dangote refinery and the largest in Africa, had in January planned to import crude from the United States, a report had said.

Traders with knowledge of the matter said Trafigura Group sold 2 million barrels of WTI Midland to Dangote refinery for end-February delivery, Bloomberg reports.