Our attention has been drawn to a publication in The Chronicle newspaper of Monday, 27th May, 2017, under the above headline “Asogli Plant Shutdown…560MW of power lost in dispute over pipeline connectivity.”
In that publication, you put out a number of inaccuracies making it necessary for us to publish this rejoinder.
Your story is about a pipeline connection with Sunon Asogli Power Plant Ltd., For that matter, Chase Petroleum, which is a licensed bulk distribution company, should not have featured in your publication. Our company, Chase Logistics Ltd., is the appropriate entity that should engage your attention.
In 2006, the Government of Ghana (GoG) gave Trafigura a concession to construct a 36-inch pipeline from the SBM mooring facility offshore Tema to the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR). The concession was operated and maintained by Kpone Marine Services Limited (KMSL), a subsidiary of Trafigura. KMSL was responsible for facilitating the receipt of crude oil and other petroleum products on behalf of TOR and other importers. The Concession Agreement was originally scheduled to end in August, 2016 but was extended to February 2017.
Since then, the GoG acting through the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) has entered into a Joint Venture (JV) Agreement with Oiltanking, which company now operates the facility.
During the pendency of the now expired Trafigura Agreement, Chase Logistics Ltd., constructed a 24-inch pipeline at its own cost to connect the Tema Tank Farm (TTF) depot to the 36-inch crude oil pipeline to facilitate receipt and export of crude oil.
Thus, while TOR’s bigger 36-inch pipeline runs from the offshore facility to the refinery, the smaller 24-inch pipeline belonging to Adinkra Storage Ltd., runs from the booster station to the Chase Logistics terminal.
The claim in your story that, “the pipeline in dispute is reportedly owned by TOR and Oiltanking” is incorrect. To begin with, there is no dispute. Secondly, the 24-inch crude oil pipeline and the tank farm it feeds belong to Adinkra Storage Ltd., which is a joint venture between Chase Logistics Ltd., and Vitol Energy.
On Sunon Asogli, we are reliably informed that the company applied to TOR to tie in its own pipeline to TOR’s 36-inch crude oil pipeline. TOR approved the request. We have further information that upon further studies, TOR discovered that that plan was constrained by certain factors.
Consequently, it was deemed that Sunon Asogli would perhaps be better off performing the tie in to Adinkra’s pipeline, which, as we have indicated, was privately constructed by Chase Logistics Ltd., at its own cost.
Indeed, we are involved in discussions with TOR to find reasonable and mutually beneficial means of helping to execute the said tie in project.
We remain committed to engaging TOR and the representatives of Sunon Asogli in fruitful discussions to enable the Sunon Asogli project to come on stream to aid the process of industrialization and to inch Ghana closer to the realization of the GoG’s industrialization drive.
It is trite knowledge that we do not have any control over any pipelines belonging to TOR. Neither do we have the power to exercise any of the authorization functions of the National Petroleum Authority (NPA) over Sunon Asogli.
Issued by the Board and Management of Chase Logistics Ltd
By: The Chronicle/Ghana
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