Chineme Okafor writes that recent developments in the 650,000 barrels a day (bd) refinery project of Dangote Group suggest the project could define how best to build largescale refineries in years to come across the world
For decades, most advanced refineries and petrochemical plants globally have been coming online in China, Saudi Arabia and India. These include world-scale projects such as the Reliance Industry’s Jamnagar Refinery in India; the Zhanjiang Refinery in China; the Yanbu Refinery in Saudi Arabia; and the Sadara Chemical Complex, also in Saudi Arabia.
But while Asia and the Middle East had been dominating the recent refinery project landscape, there are changes in the narratives with the Dangote Refinery reported to have embarked on a refinery construction project that is bringing in the best equipment in global refining history.
By implication, Dangote’s efforts would, when completed, place Nigeria within the league of biggest global refiners of the world with 650,000 barrels a day (bd) refining capacity.
By exploring new technology in its choices for the biggest and best equipment in the history of global crude oil refining, the Dangote refinery has begun to set a pace in the global oil refining sector.
The company’s appetite for the best refinery equipment was recently showcased with its importation of what was described as the world’s largest crude oil distillation column, reportedly constructed specifically to handle the operations of the 650,000bd single-train refinery located in the Lekki Free Trade Zone area of Lagos.
According to Dangote Group, due to its size, while loading the equipment on the vessel from China, it first had to be transported from the fabrication unit on a barge to a river port where a special Roll-on/Roll-off (RoRo) vessel was engaged for its movement.
It equally said the equipment had to be transported using self-propelled modular transport, with the vessel moored in a unique method called the Mediterranean moor, wherein the equipment was rolled in straight from the aft of the vessel.
With the latest development, the Dangote refinery project is said to be in the process of upstaging other recent high-profile projects, such as the majority of hydrocarbon processing plants previously commissioned in the more developed regions of the world.
Earlier this year, the company reportedly installed the biggest Residual Fluid Catalytic Cracker (RFCC) to confirm its desire to make Nigeria a top refining hub for petroleum products in Africa.
Supposedly one of the most important conversion processes used in petroleum refineries, the Dangote refinery also stated its decision to go all the way in procuring and implementing the latest processing, analytical, automation, and environmental technologies at the plant.
The refinery, as was gathered is being designed to accommodate multiple grades of domestic and foreign crude including shale oil to process into high-quality gasoline, diesel, kerosene, and aviation fuels that would meet the Euro-V emissions specifications, and polypropylene.
The company said this would include a crude distillation unit, single-train residual fluid catalytic cracking unit, diesel hydro-treating unit, continuous catalyst regeneration unit, alkylation unit, and a polypropylene unit.
Speaking during the arrival of the vessel, which conveyed the crude distillation column to Dangote jetty, the company’s Head of Maritime and Port Infrastructure, Mr. Rajen Sachar, disclosed to journalists that the equipment was the biggest single-train
