Petroleum marketer Petrocity Enterprises Ltd is set to build a new oil refinery in the country at Konza along the Nairobi-Mombasa highway. The new refinery is expected to bring relief to the economy by increasing supply of refined petroleum products on the market to complement the Kenya Petroleum Refineries Changamwe plant.
The refinery is expected to boost supply on the market to address issues of supply, pricing and fuel hoarding. Fuel shortage and fluctuation in supply has seen the commodity’s prices shoot up and in turn made the cost of living to rise as a result of high cost of production and transport.
Petrocity began construction of the refinery plant in January 2012 and expects completion of the 16 million storage capacity plant to be in December this year. The company is also is constructing a strategic petroleum storage and distribution depot which it projects will adequately meet the ever increasing demand of fuel and other petroleum products in the country. The depot would also ease congestion in Nairobi depots and enhance faster delivery of products to marketers.
The new Petrocity depot is projected to have 8 truck loading gantry with 16 loading bays, a key factor that would help the company meet the increasing demand. The company says that if the industry upgrades its technology, fuel would be cheaper by up to 11%.