Dangote Begins Expansion of Lekki Refinery, Buys 4,000 New Machines
- Dangote Industries Limited acquired 4,000 new construction machines to kick off the Lekki refinery expansion project
- The company rejected foreign contractors after international firms quoted fees of about $2.5 billion for design and supervision alone
- The Lekki refinery is already running above its 650,000 barrels-per-day design capacity, processing 700,000 barrels daily
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Legit.ng journalist Dave Ibemere has over a decade of experience in business journalism, with in-depth knowledge of the Nigerian economy, stocks, and general market trends.
Dangote Industries Limited has purchased 4,000 additional pieces of construction equipment as it moves to expand its Lekki refinery in Lagos to a capacity of 1.4 million barrels per day.
The Group Vice President for Oil, Gas and Fertiliser, Devakumar Edwin, disclosed this on Friday during a media tour of the Dangote Petroleum Refinery in Ibeju-Lekki, Lagos.
Source: Getty Images
He said the new purchase brings the company's total construction fleet to 6,500 machines, among them 330 cranes.
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Edwin explained that the company first entered the construction equipment business after Julius Berger and other contractors said they could not build the refinery's main processing facilities.
Dangote responded by purchasing 2,563 pieces of equipment, becoming one of the largest holders of construction machinery in the world at the time, Punch reports.
Edwin said:
"We ended up buying 2,563 pieces of equipment. We became the second largest company in the world in terms of construction equipment. Today, we are the largest because of the expansion."
Julius Berger later went on to construct 43 of roughly 127 support buildings on the site, covering facilities such as canteens, transformer rooms, control rooms and fire-fighting houses.
Why Dangote rejected foreign contractors
The decision to build in-house went beyond equipment.
Edwin said international engineering, procurement and construction firms had quoted fees of about 12.5% of an estimated $19.5 billion capital cost for the refinery's expansion, a figure that would have amounted to approximately $2.5 billion.
Edwin said
"I said, it's madness to go and give two and a half billion dollars to a contractor as just a fee for designing and supervising."
Instead, Dangote Projects Limited took charge of the detailed engineering, procurement and contractor management for the entire project. Edwin said the approach meant every component, down to nuts and bolts, was purchased directly rather than through a foreign intermediary.
He also noted that bringing in foreign contractors would have required shipping their equipment into and out of Nigeria, with depreciation costs passed on to Dangote.
Source: Getty Images
Refinery already running ahead of schedule
Edwin said the refinery, originally built to process 650,000 barrels of crude per day, is currently running beyond that figure.
He said:
"We have designed the refinery for 650,000, but we are now operating at 700,000. That is over 50,000 barrels per day above the design capacity."
Beyond Lekki, Dangote also plans to build a 700,000-barrel-per-day refinery in Kenya.
Edwin said the combined capacity of both projects would give the group a total refining output of 2.1 million barrels per day.
Dangote Refinery earnings jump
Earlier, Legit.ng reported that Aliko Dangote's petroleum refinery in Lagos earned more revenue in the first half of 2026 than seven other Nigerian-listed energy companies put together, according to half-year financial results.
The refinery posted N19.13tn in revenue for the six months ended June 2026, up 121% from N8.64tn recorded in H1 2025.
Source: Legit.ng
