The Port Harcourt Refining Firm (PHRC) has stopped crude oil processing simply days after the Nigerian Nationwide Petroleum Firm (NNPC) Ltd introduced the reactivation of the power.
A go to to the refinery on Friday revealed no indicators of exercise, elevating questions concerning the facility’s operations. A number of staff disclosed that the refinery was present process calibration, a course of anticipated to final till subsequent week.
This comes regardless of the NNPC’s earlier assertion that vehicles had began loading petroleum merchandise, together with petrol, diesel, and kerosene, from the refinery.
Contradicting this declare, a Punch Newspaper report quoted an nameless refinery official who mentioned the vehicles loaded on Tuesday contained “lifeless inventory” — leftover merchandise from earlier than the refinery’s shutdown in 2015/2016.
“Earlier than the refinery was shut down, we had lifeless inventory left within the tank, together with Premium Motor Spirit (petrol), DPK (kerosene), and Automated Fuel Oil (diesel),” the official mentioned.
He defined that these merchandise, saved through the facility’s rehabilitation, had been being evacuated. The petrol was described as “off-spec,” requiring separation from water earlier than use.
“For DPK, it’s in massive amount, however it has not been pushed from the tank the place it was saved for industrial functions,” the official added.
The Chief Company Communications Officer of NNPC Ltd, Femi Soneye, had claimed on Tuesday that the refinery was working at 60 p.c capability, processing 60,000 barrels of crude oil per day.
Soneye dismissed allegations from Alesa group chief Timothy Mgbere that the refinery was not producing gas.
“The outdated and new Port Harcourt refineries are built-in with a single terminal for product load-out,” Soneye acknowledged. “Which means that storage tanks and the loading gantry can obtain merchandise from each refineries.”
He urged the general public to ignore such claims, calling them “mischievous and ignorant.”
