Dangote’s Kenya Refinery Project Launches This Week at Up to $20B

Kenya breaks ground September 30 on the Dangote-backed East Africa Oil Refinery in Lamu, a project priced at $17 billion by Kenyan officials and $20 billion by Aliko Dangote himself, and designed to process 700,000 barrels of crude oil a day at Lamu’s deep-water port. It would serve Kenya, Uganda, South Sudan, Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Disclosed financing for the project totals $1.6 billion against a price tag of $17 billion to $20 billion. Tanzanian billionaire Mohammed Dewji has committed $100 million to the project. Dangote Group offered East African nations a combined 30% equity stake valued at $1.5 billion on August 21; Kenya’s economic adviser David Ndii put Kenya’s individual 10% allocation at about $500 million.

Additionally, two separate pipelines, not one, are tied to the Kenya project, and neither has a disclosed cost, capacity or completion date. Ruto told Dangote he is discussing construction of a line from Turkana’s oil fields to Lamu “to unlock the oil that we have in Turkana,” according to Kenyans.co.ke. This would be an inbound route for the refinery’s own crude supply.

Dangote is building two more pipelines unrelated to Kenya. A Djibouti-Ethiopia gas and petroleum pipeline starts construction within two months. A separate $3.5 billion, 2,650-kilometer corridor will connect Namibia, Botswana and South Africa. Dangote has described the combined program, Kenya included, as $46 billion to $50 billion and roughly 4,000 kilometers of pipeline across the continent.

Kenya’s refinery faces a competing regional project of similar scale. Tanzania and Uganda have partnered with Vitol Bahrain on a $20-billion energy hub in Tanga, built around the nearly complete East African Crude Oil Pipeline. Uganda is backing both the Lamu and Tanga projects simultaneously, while separately advancing a UAE-backed, 60,000-barrel-per-day refinery of its own in Hoima. Back in 2016, Uganda abandoned a joint pipeline route with Kenya in favor of Tanzania’s.

Dangote anticipates completion around 2029 to 2030, with construction beginning in October and running roughly three years from groundbreaking.

By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com

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