{Zambia has asked for more information about Uganda’s plans to build a 60,000 barrel-a-day oil refinery that’s already attracted interest from four regional neighbors.}
The southern African country “has asked for more information” about the plant, Ugandan Energy Minister Irene Muloni said today in a phone interview from Cape Town. Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi have expressed interest, she said. “Each of the countries will be offered eight percent and any country that will not take some or all of its shares, Uganda will take more.”
London-based Tullow Oil Plc (TLW), China’s Cnooc Ltd., and France’s Total SA are jointly developing landlocked Uganda’s crude reserves of 3.5 billion barrels in the Albertine Graben geological feature near the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo. Output from the fields may start by 2018, according to government estimates.
The government may name a winner to build the refinery by the end of next month, Muloni said. It plans to offer a 60 percent interest in the refinery to a lead investor and retain a 40 percent stake, part of which would be sold to interested countries, she said.
Uganda plans to initially build a 30,000 barrel-a-day refinery with production starting in three years, she said. Its capacity will be doubled at a cost of about $4 billion, the minister said.
“The refinery is just one destination of the crude that will be produced,” she said. A decision on the route of an oil pipeline to ship the commodity for international export to Lamu on the Indian ocean in neighboring Kenya will be made by April, according to the minister.
{{Bloomberg}}
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