President Yoweiri Musevwni has officially Launched the construction of Kampala Storage Terminal (KST) development, a major petroleum storage facility that will significantly increase Uganda’s storage capacity.
The terminal sited on 300-acre site in Namwabula, Mpigi District, about 26km West of Kampala. will store up to 320 million litres of petroleum products, and will be linked to the planned Uganda Refinery through a 211 km pipeline from Hoima.
According to the Uganda National Oil Company (UNOC), the country currently consumes an average 240 million litres of petroleum products – petrol, diesel, jet fuel, and kerosene – a month. KST will complement the 30 million litres capacity Jinja Storage Terminal and other private terminals and depots in the country to strengthen Uganda’s ability to hold significant volumes of the petroleum products in the country to withstand prolonged supply disruptions as well as contribution to the stabilization of consumer and retail pump prices.
The construction budget is about US$310 million and the funding for the project has already been secured by UNOC with support from the Government. KST Terminal will receive both imported and locally refined petroleum products, serving Kampala, the central region and other parts of the country. It is expected to be a regional distribution hub for the petroleum products once the planned linking pipeline projects and the Uganda Refinery are commissioned. The facility will enhance UNOC’s capability to sustainably implement the mandate of sourcing and distributing petroleum products, will provide storage and handling services to the Oil Marketing Companies, and also provide capacity for building and managing Government strategic fuel reserves.
UNOC will own 100% of the terminal and will be responsible for it’s operations when commissioned.
The groundbreaking comes just two weeks after President Museveni named Uganda’s crude oil Pearl Sweet on 2nd September, 2026 marking yet another significant milestone in the country’s journey towards energy sustainability.
During the naming event, President Museveni pressed the case for domestic refining, arguing that refining Uganda’s crude locally would reduce some of the costs associated with importing finished petroleum products.
“Our refinery will be one of the most profitable because, first of all, it’s far from the ocean and it does not have the transportation cost which imported oil has,” he said. “When we refine our oil here, you don’t pay transit charges.”
The KST Hub will also include a future Mpigi Remote Refinery Terminal (MRRT) which will enable different petroleum products to be received through the pipeline from Hoima, directed into storage and dispatched for onward distribution. Together, the refinery, pipeline, MRRT and KST will provide the infrastructure to move locally refined products from Hoima into the domestic market and some of the regional markets
The KST groundbreaking therefore adds another piece to Uganda’s emerging petroleum infrastructure, connecting the country’s progress towards crude oil production and refining with the storage and distribution infrastructure needed to strengthen domestic petroleum supply.
Uganda’s oil revenues could average $2 billion annually between 2026 and 2050, providing a critical fiscal boost. However, these inflows alone cannot finance the ambitious ten-fold growth objectives.
