Government of Uganda plans to develop a 60,000 barrels of oil per day refinery at Kabaale, Buseruka Sub-County in Hoima District. The Uganda Refinery Project includes:
- the refinery to be located at Kabaale in Hoima,
- a 211 km long multi-products pipeline that will evacuate refined products from the refinery to a storage terminal at Namwabula, Mpigi District
- the Mbegu Water Intake and its corresponding water pipeline and,
- the storage terminal itself, for the refinery products located at Namwabula in Mpigi District.
The Uganda Refinery Holding Company Limited (URHC), a subsidiary of Uganda National Oil Company Limited (UNOC) holds Uganda’s commercial interests on behalf of the Government of Uganda (GoU), participating with up to 40% shares in the refinery Project.
In April 2018, GoU selected Albertine Graben Energy Consortium (AGEC) as the Private Sector Investors to finance, develop, construct, and operate the Greenfield Oil Refinery estimated to cost US$ 4 billion.
AGRC comprises of:
- YAATRA Africa, a subsidiary of Yaatra Ventures LLC, a global business Company incorporated and registered in the Republic of Mauritius leads the ConsortiumInfrastructure development and finance solutions.
- Nuovo Pignone International Srl – a Baker Hughes company, incorporated and registered in Florence Italy. The firm will support the project financing.
- LionWorks Group Limited: A limited company incorporated and registered in the Republic of Mauritius – Private equity company focused on pan-African infrastructure opportunities.
- Saipem p.A – the technical arm of the Consortium to undertake the FEED and EPC for the Refinery Project. The company is incorporated and registered in Milan Italy.
To date, a number of activities towards the development of the Refinery have been completed.
The design for the Refinery has been determined to be the Residue Fluid Catalytic Cracker (RFCC) Configuration processing Uganda’s crude oil into liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), premium and regular gasoline, jet fuel, diesel, and low-sulphur fuel oil.
The Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA) studies have been completed and in the process of submission to National Environment Management Authority for review and approval.
The compensation and resettlement of affected people was completed
The Front-End Engineering Designs (FEED) for the Refinery was completed and approved.
The Final Investment Decision (FID) is expected in 2023 after which construction will commence.