Oil refinery site to be sold

The administrator of the Coryton oil refinery, which was formerly run by now‑insolvent Petroplus, revealed yesterday that a joint venture of Shell UK, Vopak and Greenergy has agreed to buy the British site.

“The joint venture parties intend that the future use of the site is to be an import terminal, after significant reconfiguration of the existing site,” the administrator, PriceWaterhouseCoopers, said in a statement.

Supplying 20 per cent of the fuel needs of London and the south-east of England, the Coryton refinery in Essex was put into administration earlier this year by its Swiss owner, Petroplus, threatening hundreds of jobs.

The administrator had said at the end of May that the site would be wound down over the next three months after the challenge of raising the £625 million needed to fund the refinery proved too much.