Dangote Refinery's Petrol Production Faces Technical Hurdles with Key Unit
The highly anticipated operational ramp-up of the Dangote Petroleum Refinery has encountered significant technical obstacles, with persistent challenges at its crucial petrol-producing unit now expected to delay full production stabilization until the first half of 2026. This development represents another setback for Africa's largest refinery, which has been closely watched for its potential to transform Nigeria's energy landscape.
RFCC Unit Emerges as Critical Bottleneck
According to analysis from Kpler and IIR, along with trade-flow data examined by Petroleumprice.ng, the refinery's Residual Fluid Catalytic Cracker (RFCC) has become the primary operational constraint. This 200,000-barrels-per-day unit has experienced repeated outages since April 2025, severely limiting gasoline production despite the facility having adequate crude distillation capacity.
Market sources indicate that while initial expectations pointed to an early February restart, the RFCC unit may not resume operations until around February 10, with possibilities of further delays still looming. This uncertainty pushes back projections for reliable, steady-state operations by several months, affecting the refinery's overall production timeline.
Crude Processing Remains Below Capacity
Current crude processing levels continue to operate substantially below the refinery's nameplate capacity. January crude runs are estimated between 280,000 and 300,000 barrels per day, with only modest increases projected for February—reaching 300,000 to 320,000 barrels per day—due to ongoing RFCC constraints.
The situation is further complicated by a planned one-week maintenance shutdown of the crude distillation unit scheduled for early February, contributing to the stop-start nature of current operations. Trade data reveals a noticeable slowdown in crude imports during January, while exports of Low Sulphur Straight Run products have increased to approximately 120,000 barrels per day month-to-date, highlighting how limited conversion capacity affects product flows.
At current operational rates, implied January output includes:
- 95,000 barrels per day of gasoline
- 120,000 barrels per day of middle distillates
These figures represent what the refinery can sustain without a fully reliable RFCC unit, rather than reflecting its complete production potential.
Gasoline Supply Maintained Through Imports
Despite the RFCC challenges, Dangote Refinery has managed to sustain gasoline supply by utilizing other secondary units, including the Continuous Catalytic Reformer and isomerization units. This strategy is supplemented by increasing imports of gasoline blending components, which climbed to about 45,000 barrels per day in January according to vessel-tracking data.
This approach ensures continued Premium Motor Spirit availability even as internal upgrading capacity remains constrained, demonstrating that import substitution remains only partially achieved at this stage of refinery operations.
Operational Adjustments and Future Projections
The refinery has implemented strategic adjustments to ease operational stress, shifting toward a lighter crude slate averaging 37–39 API gravity since the fourth quarter of 2025. While this supports CDU-linked secondary units and reduces disruption risks, analysts caution that crude quality optimization alone cannot unlock higher sustained production runs.
Ultimately, throughput above 320,000 barrels per day remains dependent on RFCC stability rather than crude availability. Base-case projections assume the RFCC will begin gradual ramp-up from late February, potentially allowing average runs of approximately 350,000 barrels per day in the first quarter of 2026 and 400,000 barrels per day across the first half of the year.
Under this scenario, gasoline output could increase to:
- 120,000 barrels per day in the first quarter
- 150,000 barrels per day by mid-2026
However, analysts warn that risks remain skewed toward the downside. For Nigeria's fuel market, Dangote's impact in the first half of 2026 is expected to be meaningful but incomplete, with supply gains arriving gradually rather than through dramatic transformation.
Competitive Pricing Amid Production Challenges
Despite these production constraints, Dangote Refinery continues to offer competitive pricing in the Nigerian petroleum market. The refinery maintains an ex-depot price of N699 per litre for petrol, while the landing cost of imported Premium Motor Spirit has fluctuated between N750 and N780 per litre according to the Major Energies Marketers Association of Nigeria.
In its latest bulletin, MEMAN reported that the landing cost dropped to N754.96 from N758 the previous week, maintaining the price advantage for locally refined products even as production faces technical hurdles. This pricing dynamic intensifies competition within Nigeria's petroleum sector while the refinery works to overcome its operational challenges.
