A substantive Chief Executive Officer (CEO) for the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) will be appointed soon to take over from the present Interim Management Committee (IMC) headed by Dr John Richardson. Energy Minister Albert Kan Dapaa said this on an Accra radio station this week.

According to the minister, the government put in place the IMC to steer affairs of the refinery following confusion that cropped up after the appointment of the former CEO, Dr Yaw Akoto, was terminated.

Hon Kan Dapaah said advertisements were placed in a number of newspapers through an agent for the position (managing director) for the refinery. The background of the new boss for the TOR, Kan Dapaah said, is not necessary, provided he or she is a good manager and can bail the refinery out of its present predicament.

The issue of funding to revamp operations of the refinery came up and the Energy Minister said negotiations are underway with Samsung Corporation of South Korea which provided the initial funding of $230m for the installation of the Residue Fluid Catalytic Cracker (RFCC) to consider topping up the loan.

TOR needs $28m as soon as possible for the revamping and improvement programmes to include installation of two new steam boilers with a total capacity of 120 MT/H to replace three old boilers of total capacity of 60 MT/H which dates back to 1963. Also needed is the installation of a new cooling water tower to reduce dependence on seawater for process cooling.

Other areas embodied in the revamping include new water plants to augment existing systems, construction of a centralised control operation for the boilers, provision of dedicated power supply system from the Volta River Authority (VRA) as a back-up and the construction of additional storage tanks to improve the tank management system.