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DMEA refInInG DMEA
AFC signs up for Guinean downstream project
afrICa
AFRICA Finance Corp. (AFC) has announced an agreement with switzerland-based Brahms Oil Refineries Ltd to finance and develop a re nery and crude storage facility in Kamsar, on Guinea’s northwestern coast.
According to a joint statement, the project will include a 12,000 barrel per day modular refinery as well as storage capacity of 76,000 cubic metres of crude oil and 114,200 cubic metres of re ned products, with nancial close anticipated in 2020.
At present, Guinea lacks any re ning capacity and the unit is expected to cater to around 33% of the country’s re ned product requirements, thereby reducing Conakry’s reliance on imports.
Guinea has no indigenous oil production and the facility will run on imported crude, which will be processed into diesel, gasoline and jet fuel for the local market.
Amadou Wadda, senior director of AFC’s project development and technical solutions team, said that “the Brahms refinery project will have a tremendous impact in the country’s development.”
Meanwhile, CEO of Brahms Oil Re neries, Daouda Fall, said: “To partner with AFC is a great milestone and brings us one step closer to our goal of reaching nancial close in early 2020 and kickstarting construction.”
e project has been on the drawing board since 2011 when Brahms registered the local pro- ject company, societe de Ra nage Guineenne. Around two years later, it appointed the then-in- dependent Us-based Foster Wheeler to carry out feasibility studies and engineering services, with the former completed in June 2014.
A law setting out investment terms was
signed with Conakry a year later and rati ed by Parliament in January 2016, nally prompting a slew of key contract awards.
In January 2017, Us-based WsP Group was appointed to carry out a geotechnical investiga- tion of the site, the results of which were deliv- ered to Brahms in April. Meanwhile, France’s Axens won the technology supply package and submitted a nal report on the proposed con- guration to sNC in June, paving the way for movement on the main contract.
In July that year, Canada’s sNC Lavalin announced the award of a front-end engineer- ing and design (FEED) and engineering, pro- curement and construction (EPC) contract on a 10,000 bpd modular re nery planned by Brahms at Kamsar.
sNC subsidiary Kentz was initially selected to carry out FEED work in August 2016 and sNC’s latest statement anticipated a nal investment decision (FID) by the developer by the end of Q3 2017. is was based on the Canadian rm’s cost estimate, and a phased conversion to an EPC contract is envisaged being agreed therea er.
The Toronto-listed firm’s announcement outlined the scope of the current phase of work, comprising project management, preliminary engineering and procurement, estimation ser- vices and preparation of an EPC execution plan covering a tank farm and marine works as well as the re nery itself.
An obscure UK-based firm identified as herman Trading announced plans in 2011 for a green eld re nery further down the coast at Bo a – with nal capacity envisaged at 150,000 bpd and a total costs estimated at $2bn. The scheme was never executed.
Week 48 05•December•2019 w w w . N E W S B A S E . c o m P9
