Ahead of inauguration, the Dangote Fertiliser Limited has begun to pre-test its $2 billion granulated urea fertiliser plant in the Dangote Free Zone in Lagos.
With a capacity of 3 million tonnes per annum, the plant has been classified as the biggest project in the entire fertiliser industry history in the world.
Siapem of Italy is the Engineering, Procurement and Supervision contractor for the project, while Tata Consulting Engineers of India is its Project Management Consultants (PMC).
Several critical sections of the plant are going through various stages of pre-commissioning and test-run.
Virtually all the sections of the plant, such as central control room, ammonia and urea bulk storage, cooling tower, power generator plant, granulation plant, have been completed and are going through pre-testing.
Dangote Fertiliser Limited has started receiving gas supply from the Nigerian Gas Company and Chevron Nigeria Limited under the Gas Sale and Purchase Agreement (GSPA) to supply 70 million standard cubic feet per day (Scf/d) of natural gas to the plant.
The project, which will create thousands of direct and indirect jobs in construction and related fields, according to the company, will provide a major boost to the agricultural sector.
Dangote also said it will significantly reduce the importation of fertiliser in Nigeria and ultimately remove the need for imports when the plant is in full production.
Dangote Industries Limited’s Group Executive Director, Strategy, Portfolio Development and Capital Projects, Devakumar Edwin said Nigeria will save $0.5 billion from import substitution and provide $0.4 billion from exports of products from the fertiliser plant.
“Thus, the supply of fertiliser from the plant will be enough for the Nigerian market and neighbouring countries.
“I am happy that by the time our plant is fully commissioned, the country will become self-sufficient in fertiliser production and even have the capacity to export the products to other African countries.”
