Nigeria’s goal to refine its own oil is set to become a reality in 2 weeks

Dangote Group's 650,000 barrels per day refinery, the world's largest single-train refinery, is set for inauguration on May 22nd, 2023, by Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari, according to a presidential aide.
The completion of the Dangote Refinery is expected to resolve Nigeria's ongoing refining problems and support the government's efforts to achieve self-sufficiency in local refining, reducing the need for costly petroleum product imports.
Delays in the refinery's construction, caused primarily by difficulties in importing equipment, have pushed back its start of production from the originally planned dates, with the refinery now expected to begin processing crude oil in 2023.

The much-anticipated launch of Dangote Group's refineries, the refinery built by Nigeria's richest man Aliko Dangote now has a date. Nigeria’s president, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (ret. ), will conduct the inauguration, according to presidential aide Bashir Ahmad.

The presidential aide relayed the message via a tweet:

Nigeria's ongoing refining problems are anticipated to be resolved by the multibillion-dollar Oil Refinery and Petrochemical Company.

This would support attempts by the federal government to make the nation independent in the local refining of crude oil in order to conserve the limited foreign currency needed in the importation of petroleum products. The Dangote Refinery, the biggest single-train refinery in the world, will have a daily capacity of up to 650,000 barrels.

The Lekki Free Zone neighborhood of Lagos is where the Dangote Refinery complex is situated. The refinery is the largest in both Africa and the world for a single train. Contrary to the usage of several distillation units by the majority of large refineries, a single-train refinery utilizes an integrated distillation unit or one crude distillation unit to refine crude oil into diverse petroleum products.

The refinery was originally scheduled to begin operations in 2016, but due to plans to increase its capacity and a change in location to a 2,500-hectare site in Ibeju Lekki on the outskirts of Lagos, the start of production is now anticipated to occur in 2020 rather than late 2019.

News of a further delay in completion broke in August. According to Reuters at the time, difficulties importing "steel and other equipment" have been primarily to blame for the issue.

Aliko Dangote, the president of the Dangote Group, had stated in January 2022 that the company's refinery unit would start processing crude oil in the third quarter of 2022, however, the plan did not materialize.