Integrated Oil & Gas Limited has said that its 20,000 bpd modular refinery is on course. The modular refinery which is located at Tomaro Island off the coast of Apapa port zone is expected to come on stream next year.
Tayo Ogunbanjo, chief executive officer of Integrated Oil & Gas Limited and the project officer of the refinery project, after an environmental screening a meeting with the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), the technical partners/engineering consultants and the environmental impact assessment consultants, said every necessary step was being taken to ensure that the refinery was delivered on schedule.
He said the meeting with the DPR was part of the imperatives for the acquisition of the Environmental Impact Assessment Report (ESR) and other approvals.
According to him, the meeting looked at the Front End Engineering designs of the refinery where the Crude Distillation Unit (CDU) was explained and analyzed and all concerns with how the various units would interface with the environment was explained, adding that after all the loose ends and every environmental concerns have been addressed, the company would get the EIA report.
The next stage, he explained, would be the presentation of the Detailed Engineering design for final screening and approval after which the company would apply for the approval to construct from the DPR.
Ogunbanjo who is driving Eko Petrochem & Refining, the special purpose company that is handling the greenfield refinery project for Integrated Oil & Gas, said the company is not leaving any stone unturned in its determination to enhance the refining capacity of Nigeria and save the citizens the agony of perennial fuel scarcity and unnecessary depletion of the foreign reserves.
Adeniyi Balogun, Environment Manager, DPR expressed satisfaction with the progress of work on the refinery project. He said as soon as the company and its consultants addressed some issues raised by the DPR team to the workshop and satisfy other requirements as demanded by the nation’s environmental laws, the approval to begin physical work on the project would be given by the DPR.
He said the federal government is quite desirous of having private refineries take off in order to end the problem of fuel importation and its associated depletion of the nation’s scarce foreign exchange and has therefore told all the approving and regulatory authorities to ensure that unnecessary impediments are removed for the private refineries to be established.
OLUSOLA BELLO
