In a desperate and almost helpless situation, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) is selling crude oil for refined petroleum products from offshore refineries.

According to reports, this should cut off accumulated debts involving unprocessed crude in refineries abroad. Information about exchanging crude for petroleum products surfaced after NNPC denied having investments in foreign refineries.

More reports reveal that NNPC had pumped the first cargo for BP of Britain under a new contract. NNPC dispatched the first crude oil cargo in January and is entitled to a share of the product that goes out of the crude oil supply to BP.

The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Mr. Odein Ajumogobia, said the the deal with BP may be part of the string of arrangements by NNPC to resolve the uncirculated supply of fuel, a situation which the Minister called a National Embarrassment.

Meanwhile, the Warri Refinery is expected process about 100, 000 barrels of crude oil day, but the output would not meet 30 percent of the estimated average daily peak demand of about 35 million liters of products.

Stakeholders at a forum organized by the Ministry in January called for recovery and expansion of the Nigeria's refining capacity as the only reliable way to phase out fuel (supply) crisis in the market.

Oil marketers represented at the forum by Deputy CEO of the Oando Group, Mr. Mofe Boyo, had declared that speedy growth of the nation's internal refining capacity was non-negotiable if government was sincere about solving supply problems in the country.

Group Executive Director, Refinery and Petrochemicals, at NNPC, Mr. Austin Oniowon, expressed his opinons about the nation's present situation. According to him, the refineries cannot work due to 55 damaged spots along a 60 kilometer feedstock pipeline. He said while the conduit lines were being fixed, the corporation should explore use of vessels to ferry crude supplies to the refineries through the inland waterways. He added that, proximate joint venture production sites should be linked for direct supplies to refineries to minimize their vulnerability to pipeline attacks.

Furthermore, Energia Today gathered that Indian Petroleum Minister Murli Deora is working towards building a 180,000 barrels per day refinery in exchange for two Nigerian deepwater oil blocks.