The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) has allocated 48.6 million barrels of crude oil to the Dangote Petroleum Refinery over the past ten months, according to official data reviewed by Vanguard. The allocation began with 3.4 million barrels in December 2023 and has reached 11.7 million barrels for October 2024.
Despite the large deliveries, sources close to the refinery have raised concerns that the allocated crude is insufficient for the refinery’s 650,000 barrels-per-day capacity. The NNPCL has not provided detailed information on the crude requirements for Nigeria’s refineries in the last quarter of 2024, though the government estimated a daily national refinery requirement of 597,700 barrels in the second quarter.
Analysis suggests that the crude supplied to Dangote Refinery may be less than half of its installed capacity, prompting questions about Nigeria’s refining optimization and crude resource management.
