The March 2016 target set by Kaduna Refining and Petrochemical Company (KRPC) to exceed 60 per cent output and produce five million litres of Premium motor Spirit (PMS) also known as fuel is under threat. An official of the company who craved anonymity, told New Telegraph that the target might elude the oil firm if activities of vandals along the Warri-Kaduna pipelines are not checked. He, however, said by phone that the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), owner of the 110,000 barrels per day installed capacity refinery, was already planning unconventional oil supply itinerary to KRPC as a major way to overcome the threat.
He explained that Managing Director, KRPC, Saidu Aliyu Mohammed, an Engineer, had earlier advocated that the company’s pipelines be tagged as ‘military zone’ in order to prevent vandals from breaking the lines and setting up their local refineries by the pipelines. “Our MD said that when he received some of your colleagues (journalists) on a facility tour of the refinery. The installation is currently operating at about 60 per cent output, with two production equipment restored after undergoing local maintenance and we hope to release about five million litres of locally refined fuel at the end of March 2016 when the maintenance is completed, thereby cutting the cost of fuel importation by the Federal Government.”
He also noted that KRPC is a three in one refinery and has the capacity to produce products that cannot be produced anywhere in Nigeria, particularly the heavy base oils and petro chemicals. The decision to construct the third NNPC refinery in Kaduna was taken in 1974 along with that of the second NNPC refinery located at Warri. However, it was decided that work would commence on the construction of the third refinery whenever the projection of the consumption of petroleum products justifies it.
NNPC said on its website that by early 1975, in view of the fuel shortages experienced then, the Federal Government decided that work on the third refinery should be advanced. It was envisaged that the refinery was to be a simple hydro skimming type in order to meet up with the fuel demand then.
with the fuel demand then. The post noted: “Based on the feasibility studies carried out, which took into consideration the consumption of the various petroleum products within the Northern Zone, and adequate means of disposal for the surplus products, a refinery with crude oil capacity of 42,000 barrels per stream day (BPSD) could be easily justified.
Hence, the refinery was designed for a capacity of 60,000 BPSD. It was much later that the Federal Government decided that the capacity for any refinery in Nigeria should not be below 100,000 BPSD. However, this would have led to the production of large quantity of heavy ends. And one practical and viable solution is reprocessing the heavy fuel oils.
“In order to do this, the whole project plans had to be modified so that what initially was planned to be simply a hydro skimming type refinery, developed into an integrated refinery. The refinery would now be able to produce a wider variety of petroleum products, some of which should be lubricating base oils.
Hence, it became necessary to import suitable paraffinic based crude oil from Venezuela, Kuwait or Saudi Arabia. “Products from the Refinery include; fuels for use as Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), Automotive Gas Oil (AGO) or diesel oil, kerosene, fuel oil, sulphur and those from the lubricating oils complex are base oils, asphalt (bitumen) and waxes.” The lubricating oil complex of Kaduna Refinery is, according to NNPC, the first of its kind in West Africa and one of the largest in Africa.
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