Page 10 - DMEA Week 10 2020

DMEA REFINING DMEA
Nigeria prepares to commission first phase of modular refinery
NIGERIA
Nigeria’s Waltersmith Petroman Oil says a modular refinery project is ahead of schedule.
NIGERIA’S Waltersmith Refining & Petrochem- ical (WR&P) has said it expects to complete the first phase of a modular refinery at the Ibigwe oilfield in Imo State ahead of schedule.
Chikezie Nwosu, the CEO of WR&P’s par- ent entity Waltersmith Petroman Oil (WPO), reported last week that the company had already launched pre-commissioning activities for the first phase of the plant, which will be able to process 5,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil. In a LinkedIn post, he said that WR&P was on track to finish the facility before the end of the 18-month period it had allotted for construction and commissioning.
His statement has been confirmed by the Nige- rian Content Development & Monitoring Board (NCDMB), which reported separately last week that the first phase of the Ibigwe refinery would begin operating in May of this year. WR&P had said previously that it hoped to bring the 5,000 bpd unit on stream in the second half of 2020.
When finished, the first phase of the plant will be able to turn out around 271mn litres per year of refined fuels, including diesel, fuel oil, kero- sene and naphtha. It will use crude oil from the Ibigwe field, a WPO-operated field that is cur- rently yielding about 7,000 bpd, for feedstock. Additionally, it will sell most of its production on Nigeria’s domestic market.
The second phase of the refinery will have a throughout capacity of 25,000 bpd and will pro- duce diesel, gasoline, jet fuel, kerosene and LPG. WR&P is due to hold a ceremony marking the start of construction work on this larger facility in May, around the same time that it marks the completion of the first-phase unit.
The WPO subsidiary is the majority owner of the refinery project, while the NCDMB holds a 30% stake.
WPO is active in Nigeria’s upstream sector and has been a participant in multiple rounds of the state-backed marginal rounds programme.™
Iran set to drive refining growth in Middle East: GlobalData
MIDDLE EAST
Iran is expected to add 1mn bpd of refining capacity by 2024.
IRAN is predicted to drive refining growth over the coming years, accounting for around 31% of planned capacity additions between now and 2024, GlobalData has reported.
The Islamic Republic has planned and announced projects that will add 1mn barrels per day (bpd) of refining capacity by 2024, the analytics firm said.
“In Iran, a total of six upcoming refineries are expected to start operations between 2020 and 2024,” GlobalData analyst Adithya Rekha explained. “The Siraf refinery, which is likely to begin operations in 2023, is the major upcoming project in the country with a refining capacity of 360,000 bpd.”
The $2.8bn Siraf project is years behind schedule, as Tehran had been banking on inter- national investment to fund construction, but re-imposed sanctions have now made this very difficult. Sanctions have also made it harder for Iran to export oil, but the measures have barely affected its fuel sales abroad.
In second place in the Middle East will be Iraq, GlobalData predicts, which should
contribute 730,000 bpd of new capacity between now and 2024. The major upcoming projects are the Karbala, Maysan and Kirkuk III refineries, each capable of handling 150,000 bpd of crude.
Next will be Kuwait, whose 615,000 bpd Al-Zour project is slated to start operations this year. Around 700,000 bpd of extra capacity will come from Saudi Arabia and Oman.™
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Week 10 13•March•2020