Dangote Group (Lagos / Nigeria; www.dangote-group.com) intends to build a new refinery in Nigeria by 2016 with downstream petrochemical operations that include a fertiliser plant and a large PP production facility. The PP plant with a rumoured capacity of 600,000 t/y will be located in the OKNLG Free Trade Zone around 150 km to the west of the capital Lagos on the coast. Fairly recently, ExxonMobil and Shell withdrew from a large liquid gas project there.

The broadly based Dangote Group is, with sales of more than USD 2 bn a year, the biggest industrial company in West Africa and one of the largest on the African continent. The entrepreneur Aliko Dangote is regarded as the wealthiest person on the African continent with assets of more than USD 16 bn. In Nigeria, considerable hopes are being pinned on this latest announcement because, unlike the majority of projects in a country that is regarded as extremely corrupt, this is a privately financed project without any government involvement. The financing agreement has been guaranteed by twelve banks headed by Standard Chartered Bank. The project is being coordinated by UOP (Des Plaines, Illinois / USA; www.uop.com), a subsidiary of Honeywell International.

According to the Plasteurope.com database Polyglobe (www.polyglobe.net), only Eleme Petrochemicals (Port Harcourt / Nigeria) – a company belonging to the major shareholder and CEO of Indorama Ventures (IVL, Bangkok / Thailand; www.indorama.net), Aloke Lohia – has so far operated polymer production lines downstream of a cracker in the oil-rich African country, namely LLDPE lines with a capacity of 240,000 t/y, PP with 95,000 t/y and PET with 75,000 t/y.