The Port-Harcourt refinery of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) has shut down operation “at the moment” with only its non-petroleum unit running which is the Crude Distillation Unit (CDU), SaharaReporters can report.
The CDU produces naphtha, kerosene and diesel but cannot produce the component which is needed for the Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) otherwise known as petrol, top sources at the refinery disclosed to SaharaReporters on Saturday.
SaharaReporters has been monitoring developments at the refinery since Tuesday when the NNPCL initially claimed the refinery was up and trucking out PMS to the Nigerian public.
SaharaReporters had exclusively reported that only the old section of the Port-Harcourt refinery was working and it was blending “Crack C5 with the Naphtha” and trucking it out as Premium Motor Spirit, which some staff warned would have an “effect” on vehicles.
The top sources had clarified to SaharaReporters on Wednesday that the NNPCL came up with the idea of blending Crack C5 with the Naphtha from the primary units because the secondary units are not ready yet.
The sources had said that though blending is a standard practice and that PMS is a blend of products, “but the blended products are reformate. Gasoline is produced from the secondary units of the process plant. These secondary units are yet to be commissioned.”
Giving an update to SaharaReporters on Saturday, a top official said only the CDU was running at the moment and could turn out only naphtha, kerosene and diesel.
“The Crude Distillation Unit (CDU) is still running but the operation of the depot is shut down at the moment. The CDU produces naphtha, diesel and Kerosene but cannot produce the component for the production of PMS,” the source revealed.
“All these products cannot serve the masses as the production of these products are in small quantities even if the plant runs at 100% throughput. The processing plant of 150,000bpd capacity will commence operations in 2026; that is if money is made readily available to meet the timelines because at the moment the project has exceeded $2billion.”
