Dangote refinery emerges as global jet fuel powerhouse amid Middle East supply crunch

Nigeria’s Dangote Refinery has vaulted from a domestic fuel supplier into a major force in global energy markets, seizing on supply disruptions triggered by the Middle East conflict to ship record volumes of jet fuel to Europe and beyond, according to data presented at an industry webinar seen by BusinessDay.

Matthew Tracey-Cook, an official at S&P Global Energy, told participants at a Major Energies Marketers Association of Nigeria event last Thursday that Dangote had become the single largest exporter of jet fuel globally in May, measured by refined product capacity,  a remarkable turn for a refinery that only recently began supplying its own domestic market in earnest.

“We actually saw in May Dangote being the largest single exporter of jet fuel globally in terms of refined product capacity,” Tracey-Cook said during the webinar, which examined shifting fuel supply routes across West Africa against the backdrop of the ongoing conflict.

The rise coincided with a severe disruption to European jet fuel supply chains. Before hostilities broke out, Europe sourced more than half of its jet fuel imports from Persian Gulf producers.

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As those flows were interrupted, benchmark prices surged above $1,800 per metric tonne, forcing buyers to scramble for alternative suppliers. Dangote stepped into the gap alongside US exporters, with data showing record shipments from the Nigerian refinery to the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, South Africa and other international destinations between April and June 2026.

The development marks a striking new chapter for Africa’s largest refinery, which was conceived primarily to end Nigeria’s long dependence on imported fuel.

While it has succeeded in growing its domestic footprint, with Tracey-Cook noting that Dangote volumes are now visibly arriving in Lagos on a regular basis, the refinery has simultaneously carved out a position as a swing supplier capable of influencing prices in markets far from West Africa.

The Lomé hub, which handles large medium-range tankers before redistributing cargoes onto smaller vessels serving ports with limited infrastructure, has itself grown slightly compared with 2024, with particularly high volumes recorded in November and December 2025.

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“These two locations, the FOB Dangote market and also the STS Lomé market, are the two largest and most important regional hubs of supply in the region as a whole,” Tracey-Cook said. Charts presented at the webinar showed significant flows of petrol, diesel and jet fuel from Dangote to Lomé, where cargoes are blended into broader regional supply chains.