The Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited on February 9, 2022 indicted four companies involved in the importation of methanol laden petrol into the country.
It revealed that MRS shipped the fuel with the vessel MT Bow Pioneer, Emadeb/Hyde/AY Maikifi/Brittania-U Consortium brought its consignment with MT Tom Hilde, Oando loaded the bad fuel on MT Elka Apollon, while Duke Oil lifted with MT Nord Gainer and shipped the product from the LITASCO Terminal in Antwerp, Belgium.
NNPC disclosed this in a statement issued by its Group General Manager, Public Affairs Division, Garba Deen Muhammad on Wednesday, February 9, 2022.
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It, however, reassured Nigerians of its capacity to restore sanity in the supply and distribution of quality Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) also known as petrol across the country within a short time.
Chief Executive Officer and Group Managing Director of NNPC, Mallam Mele Kyari, pledged at the end of its meeting with some oil marketers to resolve the issues generated by the recent supply and discharge of methanol blended petrol in some Nigerian depots.
Kyari stressed that the defaulting suppliers had been put on notice for remedial actions and NNPC was working with the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Regulatory Authority (NMDRA) to take necessary actions in line with subsisting regulations.
Explaining the incident, he said that on January 20, 2022, the company received a report from its quality inspector on the presence of emulsion particles in PMS cargoes shipped to Nigeria from Antwerp-Belgium.
He explained that NNPC “investigation revealed the presence of Methanol in four PMS cargoes imported by the following Direct-Sale-Direct-Purchase (DSDP) suppliers as listed in the table below.
He noted that cargoes quality certificates issued at load port (Antwerp-Belgium) by AmSpec Belgium indicated that the gasoline complied with Nigerian Specification.
“The NNPC quality inspectors including GMO, SGS, GeoChem and G&G conducted tests before discharge, also showed that the gasoline met Nigeria’s specification,” he said.
Kyari also stated that as a standard practice for all PMS imports to Nigeria, the said cargoes were equally certified by NMDRA appointed inspection agent.
“It is important to note that the usual quality inspection protocol employed in both the load port in Belgium and our discharge ports in Nigeria do not include the test for Percent methanol content and therefore the additive was not detected by our quality inspectors” he added.
However, to prevent the distribution of the petrol, the NNPC CEO said the company promptly ordered the quarantine of all un-evacuated volumes and the holding back of all the affected products in transit (both truck and marine).
