President Uhuru Kenyatta returns to the Coast region today to inspect the progress of the new Sh40 billion Kipevu Oil Terminal (KOT) at the Mombasa port.
The Head of State is expected to be accompanied by Chinese Foreign Affairs Minister Wang Yi.
The new terminal is financed by Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) and executed by the China Communication Construction Company (CCCC) which is expected to hand over the facility to the State agency during the inspection tour.
It will be a vast upgrade of the old terminal in terms of efficiency and turnaround as it has the ability to hold and offload volumes from four vessels (three petroleum and one LPG) at once, hence saving on the vessel’s waiting time.
The Old KOT is a single jetty with a capacity to accommodate only one vessel at any given time. Unlike the new KOT, the old terminal facility’s discharge pipe sizes were smaller hence product and discharge flow rates were also much slower although they served well at the time.
John Mwangemi, KPA Acting managing director said the new KOT is an off-shore facility located at the Port of Mombasa, opposite the existing Kipevu Oil Terminal.
“The project consists of one offshore island terminal with four berths whose total length is 770 metres and one work boat wharf at Westmont area for landing facilities,” he added.
It also has five sub-sea pipelines which were buried 26 metres under the seabed to allow for future dredging of the channel without interfering with the pipes.
Mwangemi said that the facility is designed with risers dedicated to a separate oil product connecting the terminal to the Kenya Petroleum Refineries Ltd and Kenya Pipeline Company storage tanks.
Once complete the new oil terminal facility will have four berths (one not fully equipped) capable of handling six different hydrocarbon import and export products; it is also fitted with a Liquified Petroleum Gas (LPG) facility, crude oil, and heavy fuel oil.
It also has provisions for handling three types of white oil products (DPK- aviation fuel, AGO – diesel and PMS – petrol).
This article was first published by the PEOPLE Daily.
