With the completion of the Port Harcourt Oil Refinery, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) has finalized its intentions to turn over the state-run refinery to private management.

Renowned and reliable organizations, according to the NNPCL, would handle the Port Harcourt Refining Company’s operations and maintenance.

In order to “ensure reliability and sustainability towards meeting the nation’s fuel supply and energy security obligations,” it stated that this was necessary.

The NNPCL said that the contract scope will include refinery business processes such as Short- and Long-term Production/Operations Planning; Production and Operations Execution; Monitoring, Reporting, and Optimization of Operations; Maintenance Execution; Environmental Management; Minor Projects; Health and Safety; and others in a publication posted on its website on Monday, 15th January 2024.

In order to be eligible, businesses must show that they have “a Minimum Average Annual Turnover of at least $2 billion USD for the financial years ending: 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022 respectively,” according to requests made by NNPCL.

To test-run the refinery in Port Harcourt, the NNPCL has started supplying crude oil.

The Port Harcourt Refining Company’s Area-5 Plant, located in Rivers State, has undergone mechanical completion of restoration work, as reported by the Federal Government on December 21, 2023.

It is stated that the factory will begin processing 60,000 barrels of crude oil per day after the Christmas break, indicating that the first phase of the project has been finished.

The Port Harcourt Refinery, situated in Nigeria’s oil-rich Niger Delta area, has been in operation since 1965. About 25 kilometers east of Port Harcourt, in the Nigerian State of Rivers, is where you’ll find the Alesa Eleme refinery complex.

Read Also: President Bola Tinubu Appoints 11 New Chief Executive Officers

The Nigerian Government authorized a budget of GBP 1.08 billion ($1.5 billion) in March 2021 for the refurbishment and modernization of the refinery complex.