Nigeria's 210,000 b/d Port Harcourt refinery has been allocated three cargoes of domestic light sweet crude Bonny Light in April-May, according to traders, suggesting that any issues affecting receipts in February and March might have been resolved.
The refinery — which restarted operations late last year following a revamp — has been allocated a 950,000 bl cargo loading over 5-6 April and two 475,000 bl shipments loading over 22-23 April and 1-2 May, traders said, citing the latest loading programmes. All three cargoes are to be loaded by the refinery's operator, state-owned NNPC.
Market sources said last month that Port Harcourt's February and March crude allocations had been cancelled, with one of the sources saying a crude unit at the refinery was not functioning.
This was not confirmed by NNPC. And a source at the company has since told Argus that a 475,000 bl shipment of Bonny Light had been due to be pumped to Port Harcourt before operations at the grade's export terminal were briefly disrupted by a fire on the Trans Niger Pipeline (TNP) last week.
The Renaissance Africa consortium — which recently took over operatorship of the TNP and the Bonny terminal from Shell — said pipeline flows were restored on 19 March.
Port Harcourt — which is designed to run Bonny Light — was originally built as two refineries, and rehabilitation work has only been completed at one 60,000 b/d section.
Total loadings of Bonny Light have been revised to 209,000 b/d for April across seven cargoes and have been set at 202,000 b/d for May across the same number of cargoes.
