Page 8 - Downstream Monitor - MEA Week 27
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DMEA fUeLs DMEA
Angola establishes fuel reserve
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hAVING faced recent fuel shortage crises, the Angolan government has decreed that a 30-day fuel reserve should be set up to prevent the same from happening again.
ANGOP last week quoted a presidential order that had been backdated to January 1 as stating that the reserve would contain volumes of gasoline, diesel, JeT-AI, JeT-B and kerosene to provide security of supply. It added that an additional 20-day reserve of butane (cooking gas) must be established for the same reasons.
Angola is reliant on imports for around 80% of its refined product demand, with the rest being processed at the country’s only function- ing re nery at Luanda.
In June, Sonangol announced it had signed a partners’ agreement with the United Shine con- sortium for the construction of a high-conver- sion re nery in the exclave of Cabinda.
e little known group was chosen for the job in late 2018 a er a Sonangol tender that ran through 2017, taking a 90% stake in the facility with Sonangol Re ning (Sonaref ) retaining the remainder. The greenfield facility will have a nameplate throughput capacity of 60,000 barrels per day (bpd) and will produce gasoline, diesel, fuel oil and Jet A1.
The 2017 tendering process focused on modernising and expanding Angola’s re ning capacity, which is currently limited to the ageing Luanda re nery near the capital. e largest part of this broader project centres on the planned Lobito re nery in Benguela Province.
Sonangol reported that 68 companies or con- sortia had expressed an interest in carrying out
the construction of either Cabinda or Lobito: this was cut down to seven bidders for each re nery. No award has yet been made for Lobito, but eni signed a wide-ranging deal with Sonangol in November last year that would see the Italian firm provide technical assistance to improve e ciency at the Luanda unit, as well as support- ing the development of the Lobito and Cabinda
facilities.
Fellow Italian firm Maire Tecnimont
announced on June 6 that its subsidiary KT – Kinetics Technology – had been awarded an ePC contract by eni’s local arm, relating to the Luanda unit.
e $200mn contract includes ePC activi- ties relating to two re ning process units – the naphtha hydrotreater, which includes naphtha splitting, and the catalytic reformer. e scope also includes some utilities and o sites, as well as integration with the existing facility.
e project envisages quadrupling gasoline production from the re nery from 2,000 bpd to 8,000 bpd by mid-2021, with output to be both higher in quality and more environmentally friendly.
A presidential degree dated July 1 sought to establish “the legal regime to which crude oil re ning, importing, receiving, supplying, trans- porting, distributing, trading and exporting petroleum products are subject”.
With President Joao Lourenco clearly having the downstream bit between his teeth, further announcements about re nery developments should be anticipated in the short to medium term.
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w w w . N E W S B A S E . c o m Week 27 10•July•2019
