South Sudan oil firm bids to set up a $500m regional refinery

South Sudan has the third-largest oil reserves on the continent after Libya and Nigeria, estimated at 3.5 billion barrels, with much of it yet to explored.

The refinery, to be built by American firm Chemex, is expected to be operational in two to three years, with plans to start distribution of refined petroleum products to Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of Congo by road, owing to the absence of railway and pipeline connectivity between these countries.

The EastAfrican has learnt that the feasibility study and the designs for the proposed refinery have already been concluded with Afreximbank together with big regional banks operating in Juba expected to provide financing.

“We are already making steady progress towards our refinery project. We have already identified and secured land for the refinery in Paloch. We have engaged Chemex of the United States as the project manager for this project. Separately we are close to tying up project preparatory work financing from Afreximbank and this will aid in the engineering and design work for the facility,” the firm’s chief executive Robert Mdeza told The EastAfrican in an interview.