President of the Dangote Group, Alhaji Aliko Dangote led a large team of media and businessmen on a tour of the refinery last Sunday.

A lot has been written and said about the engineering marvel. President of the Guild of Editors, Eze Anaba simply described it as ‘monstrous’.

When I got close to him I asked “Must a refinery be this big?”

He smiled and said: “It’s the biggest in the world. It’s the first of its kind. The Dangote Petroleum Refinery Project is among our many initiatives toward supporting the transformation agenda of the Federal Government.

“Our goal is to produce, within Nigeria, most of the goods that were usually imported despite having abundant resources for domestic manufacturing of the same goods. We conceived Dangote Petroleum Refinery & Petrochemicals as an answer to the perennial shortage of premium motor spirit (PMS) in the country.”

Below are 25 facts about Dangote Refinery:

1. The Dangote Petroleum Refinery and Petrochemicals a subsidiary of Dangote Industries Limited, is the world’s largest single-train petroleum refinery.

2. The 650,000 barrels per day (bpd) crude oil refinery with 838 KTPA polypropylene plant, covers area of approximately 2,635 hectares and is located in the Dangote Industries Free Zone, Ibeju-Lekki, Lagos.

3. Total storage capacity of 4.5 billion liters which can cover: *20 days crude requirement *Product storage for 15 days of Nigeria’s gasoline consumption

4. The Dangote Petroleum Refinery is an industrial plant that transforms crude oil into various usable petroleum products such as diesel, gasoline (petrol), jet fuel, and kerosene.

5. The Refinery produces Euro-V quality gasoline and diesel, as well as jet fuel and polypropylene.

6. The Refinery is designed to process a large variety of crudes including many of the African Crudes, some of the Middle Eastern Crudes, and the US Light Tight Oil.

7. Dangote Petroleum Refinery can meet 100% of the Nigerian requirement of all liquid products (Gasoline, Diesel, Kerosene & Aviation Jet) and have surplus of each of these products for export.

8. The Refinery is designed to use the latest technology to comply with stringent guidelines and regulations to protect the local environment, and at the same time produce the latest environmentally friendly petroleum product for worldwide markets.

9. The Refinery design conforms to the World Bank, US EPA, EU, and Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) emission/effluent norms.

10. The Refinery has its own dedicated steam and power generation system with adequate standby units for reliable/uninterrupted utility supply to operating plants.

11. It has a 435MW power plant that can meet the total power requirement of Ibadan Distribution Company, covering five states, including Oyo, Ogun, Osun, Kwara, and Ekiti.

12. Dangote is one of the few companies in the world executing a Petroleum Refinery and a Petrochemical complex directly as an Engineering, Procurement, and Construction (EPC) Contractor.

13. The Petrochemical Plant is designed to produce 77 different high-performance grades of polypropylene. Petrochemical is the source of raw materials for many manufacturing and assembling plants.

14. It maximizes Gasoline which is in high demand-53%of the production capacity compared to 22% of the existing refineries in Nigeria.

15. It maximizes value addition- Extract maximum value from every barrel of crude.

16. It minimizes low-value Fuel Oil.

17. The Refinery is estimated to generate an annual market value of US $21 billion for Nigerian crude oil, Foreign exchange savings/earnings of US $9.9 billion.

18. 56% of the production would be exported, with a foreign exchange generation of approx. $17 billion.

19. It ensures over $25 billion addition to the GDP, through massive value addition within the country.

20. Products from the plant will serve as raw materials for the production of polyvinyl chloride (PVC), which is used extensively across a broad range of industrial, technical and everyday applications including widespread use in building, transport, packaging, electrical/electronic and healthcare applications.

21. Dangote Industries developed a port and constructed quays with a load-bearing capacity of 25 tonnes/ sq meters to bring Over Dimensional Cargoes close to the site directly to handle liquid cargoes.

22. The Jetty is situated at a distance of 12.3 km from the refinery thereby effectively reducing the travel time.

23. The Refinery has capabilities for both land and sea evacuation to serve both domestic and export markets
Dedicated marine facilities for off-take of crude and loading of petroleum products.

24. • Self-sufficient marine facility with ability for freight optimization.
•Largest single order of 5 Single Point Mooring systems (SPMs) anywhere in the world.
•2 crude SPM for unloading ships up to ULCCs.
•3 products SPM for product exports up to Suez Max vessels.
•2 X 48″ sub sea crude pipelines with interconnection.
•3X24″subsea pipelines for products and imports.
•120 km subsea pipeline.
•Crude offloading capacity – 108,500 barrels/hour (17.25million liters /hr).
•Product loading capacity – 77,000 barrels/hour (12.32million liters/hr).

25. Dangote Petroleum Refinery maintains high standards for all its business practices, valuing health, safety, environment and rights for its employees, compliance with all applicable local and international laws, and being a committed partner to host communities, governments and also environment friendly.