The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation on Wednesday said the nation’s refineries would begin to operate optimally up to 90 per cent capacity by 2016.
The NNPC’s Group Executive Director of Refining and Petrochemicals, Ian Udoh, stated this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Abuja.
Udoh said that the corporation commenced rehabilitation of refineries in the country in October 2014 and was expected to last for 18 months.
He listed refineries to include the Port Harcourt Refining Company, Kaduna Refining and Petrochemical Company Limited and the Warri Refining and Petrochemical Company Limited.
He said that the three refineries would no longer be sold or privatised.
Rather, they would be fixed for maximum capacity utilisation.
Udoh said: “We are rehabilitating them and we have started the programme of phased rehabilitation using local resources and in-house competencies spread over a period of 18 months, which started in October last year.
“By the end of this year (2015) or early next year, the refineries will be a significant better position than they are right now.”
Udoh, who said that the target for completion of rehabilitation was early next year, added that the refineries situation was not going to be turned around suddenly.
He said: “It is gradual.
“We ordered a lot of materials and as they come, we install them using our local in-house resources.
“It is an ongoing process, but we allow reliability of our refineries to continue to improve across the period.
“This is so because most of our problems have to do with reliability of the plants.”
While noting with concern that the frequency of shutting down refineries for repairs was high, Udoh however expressed the belief that it would gradually diminish until they attained 90 per cent capacity next year.
He said that the corporation was making use of its in-house engineers and the contractors that had been working with it all these years.
He said: “We are familiar with them and they are also familiar with the plants over a period of 18 months.
“We kicked off in October and the refineries are gradually coming back the way it should be, without handing out any big controversial contract award.”
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