Africas richest man signs USD650M Afreximbank loan for oil refinery

MOSCOW (MRC) - Africa's richest man, Aliko Dangote, has signed a USD650 million loan facility with the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) for his oil refinery project in Nigeria, as per Engineeringnews.

The seven-year term loan would attract a moratorium of five years, according to facility terms read out during the signing. Cairo-based Africa's trade bank also signed a USD750 million facility with Nigeria's development bank, the Bank of Industry.

Reuters witnessed the signing of both loans on Saturday. Dangote Group Executive Director Devakumar Edwin told Reuters last week that the oil refinery would cost around USD10 billion and should be completed by December 2019.

He said the company would borrow USD3.3 billion for the project, arranged by Standard Chartered Bank. The remainder will be funded by equity and through export agencies.

Dangote built his fortune on cement and now has interests in flour milling, agriculture and real estate. He is building the world's largest single oil refinery and also expanding into fertiliser, aiming to address long-standing problems in Nigeria's energy markets.

The refinery and petrochemical complex is located on 25,000 hectares of swampy land with a jetty to ferry products by sea within Nigeria and abroad including an undersea pipeline to transport gas. It would account for half of Dangote's sprawling assets when it is finished next year.

Dangote intends to process different grades of crude to meet local demand for refined petroleum products and also target export markets abroad.

Afreximbank, celebrating its 25 years of operation this year, aims to foster intra-African trade through the creation of a payment platform to ease settlement and currency risks.
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MOSCOW (MRC) - China National Offshore Oil Corp (CNOOC) is willing to invest USD3 billion in its existing oil and gas operation in Nigeria, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) said on Sunday following a meeting with the Chinese in Abuja, as per Reuters.

During a visit to Nigeria's state-owned NNPC, CNOOC Chief Executive Yuan Guangyu said the Beijing-based oil company had invested more than USD14 billion in its Nigerian operations and expressed readiness to invest more.

Guangyu said Nigeria was their largest investment destination and also asked the NNPC to seek common grounds with CNOOC for enhanced productivity.

Nigeria has been holding talks with oil majors over new finance agreements for joint ventures since last year. The NNPC last year signed financing agreements with Chevron and Shell worth at least $780 million to boost crude production and reserves.

Other western oil companies, including ExxonMobil (XOM.N), operate in Nigeria through joint ventures with NNPC.
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MOSCOW (MRC) --Explosions at a gas plant in Bellville Tuesday prompted evacuations of residents and businesses in the area, local officials said, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Smoke and fire could be seen for miles from the Western International Gas plant where a series of early morning explosions were reported. The plant provides bulk industrial gases such as acetylene.

Austin County Sheriff Jack Brandes said mandatory evacuations were ordered for anyone within a 1-mile radius of the plant. A voluntary evacuation was also ordered for anyone within two miles of the plant.

Brandes said the fire was still active hours after the initial incident was reported. Local emergency responders said they did not have a time frame as to when the fire would be out or when a nearby highway would reopen.

There were no reported injuries.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Sinopec Maoming Petrochemical has shut its No. 2 low density polyethylene (LDPE) unit for a brief maintenance, as per Apic-online.

A Polymerupdate source in China informed that the unit was shut for a maintenance turnaround on July 14, 2018. It is likely to resume production on July 19, 2018.

Located at Guangdong in China, the No. 2 unit has a production capacity of 280,000 mt/year.

As MRC informed before, Sinopec Maoming Petrochemical conducted a brief turnaround at its LDPE unit No. 1 in early September 2017. Thus, the company resumed operations at this unit on September 2, 2017. The plant was shut for a maintenance on September 1, 2017. Located at Guangdong in China, the unit has a production capacity of 120,000 mt/year.

Sinopec Maoming Petrochemical Company (Maoming Company) - a subsidiary of Sinopec- is located in Maoming, Guangdong and was founded in May 1955. The company now has a crude oil processing capacity of 13.5 million t/a and an ethylene production capacity of 1 million t/a. Maoming Company has turned out to be a large-scale integrated refining and chemical enterprise with refining as the leading business and petrochemical sector as the mainstay.

China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation, or Sinopec Limited is a Chinese oil and gas company based in Beijing, China. It is listed in Hong Kong and also trades in Shanghai and New York . Sinopec is the worlds fifth biggest company by revenue.
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MOSCOW (MRC) -- Thailand's HMC Polymers, owned by PTT Global Chemical Public Company Limited (PTTGC), LyondellBasell and Thai investors, will resume full polypropylene (PP) production at Map Ta Phut in August, as per Apic-online with reference to a company source.

The company has three lines which were each shut for around 10 days, the source added. The No. 1 PP line has a nameplate capacity of 200,000 mt/year, No. 2 PP unit with a capacity of 250,000 mt/year and No. 3 PP line has a 300,000 mt/year capacity.

As MRC wrote previously, in 2010, HMC Polymers increased the production capacity of its PP plant by 300,000 tonnes from 450,000 tonnes in a bid to serve growing demand for polypropylene both domestically and internationally.

HMC Polymers is one of the leading companies in the manufacturing and marketing of polypropylene (PP) for Asia and worldwide. HMC Polymers is the first PP manufacturer in Thailand with its first PP production facility to have been established in Rayong Province, Thailand in 1987. The company's PP production facilities output is over 750,000 metric tons per year and comprise two Spheripol lines and a latest technology Spherizone line from LyondellBasell. HMC Polymers produces a wide range of Moplen polypropylene grades including homopolymer, heterophasic and random copolymer resins, as well as specialty polypropylene resins such as Adstif, Clyrell and Purell. In addition, a strategic investment in upstream integration was made in parallel with the construction of a Propane Dehydrogenation plant (PDH) at a site adjacent to our Map Ta Phut plant.
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