Oilmoz to Build an $8 Billion Oil refinery in mozambique

Oilmoz to Build an $8 Billion Oil Refinery in Mozambique

04-09-2008

Oilmoz Lda, a company founded by former Mozambican foreign affairs minister Leonardo Simao, plans to start building an $8 billion oil refinery in Mozambique within two years after the country's only facility shut in 1984.

``We've already got the financial structure ready with a consortium of banks,'' Fausto Cruz, co-founder of Oilmoz, said in an interview, declining to name any of the banks. The refinery will have a capacity of 350,000 barrels a day when it starts operating in six to seven years, Cruz said.

While state-run oil company, Petromoc, will own a stake in the plant, the exact shareholding structure hasn't been decided, Cruz said. An environmental impact study should be completed within 18 months, he added. No decision has been taken on the refinery's location.

Mozambique's only oil refinery closed 24 years ago, leaving it dependent on fuel imports. Rockwall, Texas-based Ayr Logistics also plans to build a $4.5 billion refinery with a capacity of 300,000 barrels a day in the southern African country. Ayr said that it expects an environmental impact study on the plant, in the northern port city of Nacala, to be completed this year.

In neighboring South Africa, state-run PetroSA plans to build a 250,000-barrel-a-day refinery for as much as $7 billion by 2014. Sasol, the region's biggest fuel producer, is investing on 80,000 barrels-a-day coal-to-fuel plant.