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DMEA Commentary DMEA
production from the refinery from 2,000 bpd to 8,000 bpd by mid-2021, with output to be both higher quality and more environmentally friendly.
Soyo news
on December 11, Angola’s state news agency ANGoP said that Luanda would extend the deadline for international firms to bid on a refinery in Zaire Province to January 31, 2020. It had been scheduled to close next week under a build-operate-transfer (BoT) basis.
In June, Angola’s Ministry of Mineral Resources and oil (MIREMPET) launched an international public tender for the construction of a refinery to be built at Soyo; however, no suit- able offers have yet been received.
The facility is designed to have a capacity of 110,000 bpd of crude to produce LPG, gaso- line, benzene, jet A-1 and kerosene. Local press reported that it would consist of a processing unit, a crude warehouse, transport, an accessory installation area, 79 fuel storage tanks and a pier to moor two 100-tonne tankers.
Sonangol had announced the breaking of ground on the $500mn Soyo plant in June 2015, quoting a construction timeframe of 26 months.
Then-chairman Francisco de Lemos led the breaking ground team, which included officials of one of the contractors, the Hong Kong-based China International Fund (CIF). A represent- ative of CIF said that the plant would make
it possible for Angola to “completely reduce imports of major products.”
The timeframe for the completion of the new version of the project has not been announced.
MIREMPET said that “the alteration of the tender date aims to ensure a better quality of bid”, though Resources and Petroleum Minister Diamantino Azevedo said on Monday that the project remained on track for completion by the end of 2023.
Fuel trading licences
In related news, ANGoP reported last week that the Luanda provincial administration was preparing to start issuing licences to individual investors for small-scale trading in petroleum products.
Provincial authorities had discussed the sub- ject on December 5 at a training seminar for municipal officials on the transfer of skills related to the oil sector, the news agency said. They had also presented models for the licences, it stated.
At the seminar, representatives of the provin- cial administration explained that Luanda was due to join the other 17 Angolan provinces that have been issuing such licences since 2013 as of December 16.
The licences permit individual investors to build and operate filling stations that can dis- pense gasoline, diesel, kerosene, butane and lubricants into containers with a capacity of up to 200 cubic metres, they explained.
Gemcorp’s proposed choise of location for the Cabinda refinery.
Resources and Petroleum Minister Diamantino Azevedo.
Week 49 12•December•2019 w w w . N E W S B A S E . c o m P5
