A brownfield refinery with a production capacity of 100,000 barrels per day (bd) and formerly owned by BP Plc is expected to be relocated from Turkey to Nigeria and co-located alongside the Port Harcourt Refinery, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) disclosed on Tuesday in Abuja.

The NNPC in a statement from its Group General Manager, Public Affairs, Mr. Ndu Ughamadu, said the relocation of the refinery was part of the refinery co-location initiative designed by the federal government to boost local refining capacity.

The statement explained that the Group Managing Director of NNPC, Dr. Maikanti Baru, disclosed this development in an interview he granted an in-house newsletter of the corporation – the NNPC News, in which he spoke on efforts by the corporation to help Nigeria end its reliance on imported petroleum products.

“Our co-location initiative aimed at getting private sector investors to bring in brownfield refineries so that they can share facilities is also yielding results. For example, there is one that is going to be brought in from Turkey to be located near the Port-Harcourt Refinery.

“It’s not a modular refinery; it’s a normal refinery with about 100,00bpd capacity. It was owned by BP, but it has been sold off now to the companies that want to bring it over from Turkey to install it here,” the statement quoted Baru to have said in the interview.

Baru, noted that the investors had commenced the process of relocating the refinery to be installed near the Port Harcourt Refinery under the co-location initiative, adding that a similar plan to establish a brownfield refinery near the Warri Refinery was also in the offing.

“There is another one of about the same size being looked at to be sited near the Warri Refinery. But the one for Port-Harcourt is at a more advanced stage. Our drive at the NNPC, as a leader in the industry, is to expand our local refining capacity and make Nigeria a global refining hub,” the corporation’s helmsman stated.