Dangote Industries Ltd has run a single train, 650,000Barrels Per Stream Day (BPSD) Refinery for close to two years and is satisfied with the delivery.
The company’s proposed expansion to a 1.4MillonBPSD plant, comes with another single train.
In July 2025, DIL said it planned to raise capacity from 650,000BPSD to 700,000BPSD.
That capacity addition required “debottlenecking”, which will be completed such that the refinery should operate at 700,000BPSD by “early 2026”.
That minor expansion is separate from the 750,000BPSD second line, which was announced last Sunday, October 26, 2025. The world’s largest single train refinery is thus about to be expanded to become the world’s largest refinery.
Dangote refinery is designed with a dedicated power plant for pumping products from storage. While many refineries require turnaround maintenance every two years, Dangote is designed for four-year cycles.
The company plans to erect the new plant in the next three years, right in the same premises that the existing refinery is located. The new facility will utilise the existing infrastructure, including the jetty which juts into the Atlantic, as well as the evacuation and offloading ecosystem.
Dangote’s sights are set on all of Africa. “There is no African country that is not an importer of petroleum products. Algeria stopped importing but it now imports”, he told the roomful of journalists in the ballroom of the Eko Hotel.
Aliko Dangote was accompanied on the podium at the press conference by his associates, including Dan Kunle, a ranking energy analyst; Femi Otedola, one time major importer of diesel into the country and Robert Odiachi, a Governance & Policy specialist.
Africa’s crude oil refining capacity has contracted in the last 15 years, while the continent’s demand for petroleum products has surged, in the last 30 years, AOGR reported last week. Mr. Dangote sees this shortfall in refining capacity as a huge opportunity, just as he also focuses on markets in Europe and elsewhere on the planet. “The refinery would upgrade its production from Euro V fuel to Euro VI fuel standards, aligning with the highest global environmental benchmarks”, Dangote disclosed.
As part of the project, power generation at the facility would be increased from 500 megawatts to 1,000 megawatts.
Dangote threw jabs at Nigerian upstream operators, who produce the bulk of the country’s crude, saying that “they hide under the willing buyer-willing seller” policy to deny him crude supply. He repeated, time and again, that Nigeria should refine all of its crude and export refined products.
Mr. Dangote said he was confident that the policies of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu will deliver on improved supply of feedstock. He noted, erroneously, that Nigeria was currently producing 1.8Million Barrels of oil a day and was targeting 2.4Million BPD by next year. In reality, the last time the country breached the 1.7MMBOPD (crude and condensate) mark was July 2025 (according to figures by the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission). Then again, to achieve 2.4MMBOPD would require in excess of 600,000BOPD addition over the next 12 months, which is quite a stretch.
Still, the businessman’s constant look on the bright side is inspiring, even charming.
“This expansion reflects our confidence in Nigeria’s future, our belief in Africa’s potential, and our commitment to building energy independence for our continent and the world. It also is about confidence in Nigeria, in Africa, and in our capacity to shape our own energy future,” Dangote said. “It is the dream of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, for Nigeria to emerge as one of the major suppliers of petroleum products in the world. And with his strong backing through his policies, we are taking on the challenge to make this happen”
