Billionaire Ineos owner warned not to block sale of Grangemouth oil refinery
Billionaire Ineos owner Jim Ratcliffe has been warned not to stand in the way of a credible bidder for the Grangemouth oil refinery. The Sunday Mail can reveal Aberdeen based Stacey Oil is acting as a broker to negotiate a possible bid from a major North American firm looking to “vertically integrate” the site into its existing business.
Former MP Kenny MacAskill, who has campaigned relentlessly to keep the refinery open, has been involved in bringing the company to the table.
He said: “The Scottish and the UK Government need to step up and make sure all possible steps are being taken to keep the refinery open and to support any possible bid to buy it if Petroineos are not willing to operate the site themselves.
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“Petroineos must also be told in no uncertain terms that it would be unacceptable for them to retain control of the site while shutting down the refinery if a viable alternative bid is on the table.
“This is a key industrial asset and closure will have deep ramifications not just for jobs but also energy security across the UK.”
Petroineos is a joint venture between Manchester United owner Ratcliffe’s Ineos and Chinese government controlled PetroChina. MacAskill has also highlighted a deal in which the UK Government has given Ineos a £600million loan guarantee for a chemicals plant in Antwerp, Belgium.
He added: “Not a penny should be given to Ineos until a guarantee is given that the refinery remains open, it is clearly obscene that public funds could be used to support a company’s activities in other countries while they decimate Scotland’s industrial base.”
Trade union Unite, which represents hundreds of workers at the refinery, has said he believes the takeover proposals to be credible.
General Secretary Derek Thomson said: “If there are investors interested in buying the Grangemouth oil refinery then Unite stands ready to enter discussions on any serious proposal which could deliver an extension of its operations.
“Our priority is to protect all jobs and any viable option needs to put to Petroineos and the Scottish and UK governments. We await details on any concrete proposal but it is Unite’s firm belief that due to highly-skilled workforce at the refinery it can still have a future and it remains an attractive proposition.”
Petroineos confirmed on Thursday that it was closing the facility on the Firth of Forth with the loss of 400 jobs. The company plans to turn the site into an import depot for oil products refined in other parts of the world.
There are fears this could mean Russian crude entering the UK via third countries to avoid sanctions. We can also reveal the Stanlow oil refinery in northern England is expanding in anticipation of Grangemouth closing.
The Stanlow facility, near Liverpool, plans to invest in infrastructure including terminals, and is adding storage capacity to cut logistics costs.
Deepak Maheshwari, head of the refinery, said: “We are trying to increase our footprint. It is important for us to provide customers with a proposition to have a national contract rather than a regional contract.”
Michelle Thomson, MSP for Falkirk East, has been holding talks with Stacey Oil, but has said she cannot not identify the interested party because she had agreed to keep the information confidential.
Petroineos said the closure would “safeguard fuel supply for Scotland” by converting the site into a terminal to import petrol, diesel, aviation fuel and kerosene. But this would require a workforce of fewer than 100 employees compared to the current 475 and would leave Scoptland as the only major oil producing country in the world without its own refinery.
Grangemouth is the main supplier of aviation fuel for Scotland’s airports and a major supplier of petrol and diesel ground fuels.
A spokesman for Petroineos said: “We have seen no evidence of a credible bid for the refinery. If a genuine offer is forthcoming, we will engage seriously with it. Since Petroineos was formed in 2011, our shareholders have invested nearly £1bn in the refinery, absorbing losses of more than £590m in the same period. This year alone, we are anticipating losses of more than £150m.”
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “The Scottish Government has no direct involvement with any potential buyer for the Grangemouth site. Any interested parties should be engaging with Petroineos as the owners of the refinery.”
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