The Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) has issued an operational licence to Edo Refinery and Petrochemical Company Limited, located in Ologbo, Edo State.
At a ceremony on Tuesday, Farouk Ahmed, CEO of NMDPRA, presented the certificate to AIPCC Energy Limited, the parent company of Edo Refinery.
Ahmed handed the operational licence to Segun Okeni, the refinery’s Head of Technical Operations. During the handover, Farouk commended the company for achieving this milestone and encouraged them to do more.
Responding on behalf of AIPCC Energy, Okeni stated that the company would continue to make contributions to the petroleum refinery and gas processing subsector.
He mentioned that AIPCC is developing three other projects, with one expected to be completed within the next year.
Okeni explained that the operational licence represents the final stage of approval from the regulatory authority, indicating that the plant can now fully operate as a refinery.
“It starts from licence to establish, licence to construct, approval to introduce hydrocarbon, pre-commissioning and commissioning, operate the refinery for some time to ensure it can do so and finally the licence to operate LTO,” he said.
Okeni also revealed that the refinery is finalizing plans with a domestic oil company to access crude oil for optimal production capacity.
