Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, is set to break ground on a new $16 billion mega-refinery in Kenya on Wednesday, describing the project as a vital step towards achieving fuel self-sufficiency across the continent.

Dangote, who established Africa’s largest oil refinery in his native Nigeria, said the East African facility would have a capacity of 700,000 barrels per day, making it larger than any refinery in Europe.

The refinery is being built on the Indian Ocean coast at Lamu, where Kenya is also developing a major port.

The project has already faced a lawsuit from a local community over land rights. A court ruling published on Monday allowed the groundbreaking to proceed, although the case will continue.

Greenpeace and other environmental groups have also raised concerns about the project’s potential environmental impact.

Dangote dismissed the challenges on Tuesday, telling reporters: “There’s actually no problem with these sort of cases… There are people who don’t want the development of Africa.”

Tanzania and the Kenyan port city of Mombasa had previously been considered as possible locations for the refinery, but Dangote said Lamu was “much better”, citing its “better, cleaner water”, “solid land” and “deep sea area”.

He said the refinery would also include a 1,000-megawatt power facility, with half of the electricity generated supplied to the Kenyan national grid.

Dangote described the refinery as a significant step towards reducing Africa’s reliance on imported fuel and foreign expertise.

“By 2030, the majority of African countries will be self-sufficient (in fuel). It does not matter where it is refined, but it should be in the African continent, on the soil of Africa,” he said.

“If anybody is doing a big project going forward, you don’t have to go and bring Chinese or Indians and build it for you,” he added.

Questions have also been raised about where the new refinery will source the crude oil needed for processing, given that East African countries are only beginning to develop significant oil reserves.

Dangote said the refinery would source crude from multiple locations, including the Middle East, the United States and other regions. He added that it would also be ready to process crude from countries such as Kenya, Tanzania and Mozambique as their oil production increases.

“Are we going to wait until (Africa has) one quarter of the world’s population before we start thinking of what to do? We have to start addressing that issue today,” he said, referring to US President Donald Trump’s threats to halt diesel exports.

He stressed that the Kenyan refinery would only represent a small part of the capacity needed to meet Africa’s growing energy demand as the continent’s economy expands.

“When you talk about 700,000 barrels per day, it’s actually small. For the region, it’s a big refinery, it’s a big investment, but it is a start-up,” he said.