The Petroleum Rental Owners Association of Nigeria (PETROAN) has described as rumour the report that Port Harcourt Refinery has been shut down.
Spokesman of PETROAN, Dr. Joseph Obele who stated this in a statement said the refinery is currently operating at 70% of its installed capacity, with plans to ramp up to 90%.
It could be recalled that on Tuesday 26th November 2024, the top Management of Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC Ltd) took stakeholders and journalists to the plant in view of having a first-hand information and to see things themselves.
He said PETROAN as key stakeholders, encourages whoever is doubting the functional status of the plant to contact NNPCL’s management for facility tour rather than spreading misleading information.
Obele clarified that the functional plant at operation is the old refinery with the capacity of 60,000 barrels per day, while the new Port Harcourt refinery with the capacity of 200,000 barrels per day is still under rehabilitation which is due to commence production soon.
According to the statement, the old Port Harcourt refinery which was built in the year 1965 stopped production over 21 years ago, while the new Port Harcourt refinery stopped production in the year 2019.