The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation has said it is set to rehabilitate the country’s refineries in Port Harcourt, Warri and Kaduna.
The Group Managing Director of the NNPC, Austin Oniwon, said this on Thursday in Enugu in his speech at the NNPC Special Day at the 23rd Enugu International Trade Fair.
Oniwon, who was represented by the Executive Director, Port Harcourt Refinery, Dominic Ikpemauzu, said the rehabilitation had become necessary to increase domestic refining and stem products importation.
With Nigeria’s total production capacity put at 445,000 barrels per day, Oniwon said: “The strategy is aimed at ensuring an effective implementation of the Turn Around Maintenance and Rehabilitation works of the refineries.
“Other infrastructure being put in place by the corporation to drive the economy include the conclusion of feasibility studies on the Greenfield refineries and rehabilitation of product pipelines such as Kaduna-Kano, Kaduna-Gusau and Kaduna-Suleija.
“It should be noted that all our efforts to build facilities in the downstream sector are aimed at increasing local refining to a minimum of 60 per cent of local consumption by 2013 and 100 per cent by 2015.”