Plans for a major oil refinery in East Africa have taken a significant step forward after Dangote Industries Limited confirmed that the project will be built in Kenya.
The planned refinery will have a capacity of 700,000 barrels of oil per day and will be located in Lamu, ending months of speculation over where the multi-billion-dollar investment would be established.
The announcement was made by Edwin Devakumar, the Vice President in charge of oil and gas at Dangote Industries Limited, who said the refinery will be developed on Lamu Island along Kenya’s coast.
According to him, construction of the facility is expected to take about 30 months once work officially begins.
Before the final decision was made, Tanzania was also being considered as a possible location for the refinery. Last month, Africa’s richest businessman, Aliko Dangote, visited Tanzania and held talks with President Samia Suluhu Hassan.
During the meeting, he explained the commercial and technical reasons that led the company to choose Lamu instead of Tanzania for the project.
Dangote also invited Tanzania to take part in the investment despite the refinery being based in Kenya.
The move shows that the company hopes the project will benefit the wider East African region through trade, energy supply and investment opportunities.
The decision marks a change from earlier plans, as Dangote had previously indicated that Mombasa was his preferred location in Kenya.
The company has now settled on Lamu, a region that has been identified as an important gateway for energy and infrastructure projects because of its strategic location on the Indian Ocean.
The planned refinery is expected to become one of the largest industrial projects in East Africa.
If completed as planned, it could strengthen Kenya’s position in the regional energy sector and support fuel supply across neighbouring countries.Dangote already operates a 650,000-barrel-per-day refinery in Nigeria, which started operations in 2024.
It is currently the largest refinery in Africa. The company also plans to expand that facility to a capacity of 1.4 million barrels per day by 2028, a move that would make it the largest oil refinery in the world.
The planned refinery in Lamu is expected to add to Dangote’s growing investments in Africa while increasing Kenya’s role in the continent’s energy industry.
