Uganda has joined the crude oil exporters club, with prospects for the hydrocarbon sector in the country looking bright. Reports say the country will soon export its first crude oil from its Lake Albert oil discovery to the international market, making it one of the countries to have joined the oil exporting countries.
This comes on the heels of an agreement between Uganda and neighboring with Tanzania, which enables the former to transport its crude oil through the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP), a 1,445-kilometre pipeline from Hoima, Uganda, to the port of Tanga in Tanzania.
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A statement from the African Petroleum Producers Organisation (APPO) yesterday said Uganda and Equatorial Guinea are standing out as among the traditional African oil giants that have been rapidly growing their oil and gas credentials, even as over 200 senior executives from international and oil companies, along with ministerial delegations from leading African nations gather in the Africa Oil Week holding in South Africa to look for solutions to Africa’s energy challenges.
Irene-Margaret Muloni, minister of energy and mineral development, Uganda, said the times are exciting for Ugnada. “It is exciting times for Uganda, we are now preparing for production. It has taken us some time, but we are there. The exploration discovered six billion barrels and we have plans to recover about 1.4 billion of these. And now the issue is to get that out of the ground. We’ve already agreed with Tullow, Total and CNOOC the way forward to commercialise that oil.
“We need two big destinations. One is access to the international markets through the pipeline to add value and ensure security of supply within the East Africa region. Also, we are importers of petroleum products now, so we have a refinery under development.” That refinery is planned for Kabaale in Western Uganda’s Hoima district, along the eastern shore of Lake Albert, close to the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Once the refinery is completed, expected to be in 2022, it will produce kerosene, gasoline, diesel, heavy fuel oils for Uganda and other local markets. In addition to the refinery an airport, hospital and a 100-megawatt thermal power plant are being constructed.
“For these two big projects the pipeline is more advanced with the FEED signed and an intergovernmental agreement with Tanzania. We are now negotiating the host government agreements between us and setting up the private companies that are going to own and operate the pipeline. For the refinery we’ve already approved the configuration of the refinery that will handle 60,000 barrels per day. Those two projects are ongoing and as a country we are preparing the infrastructure,” the minister stated
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