The idled Limetree Bay, St. Croix refinery is set to restart after Limetree Bay Refining reached an agreement in principle with the supply and trading arm of a major international oil company.
Under the terms, the currenty undisclosed oil company would enter into a tolling agreement and serve as the refinery’s supply and offtake counterparty. Limetree Bay Refining anticipates completion of the restart by late 2019.
Limetree Bay Terminals, which is an affiliate of Limetree Bay Refining, purchased the refinery and associated terminal assets out of bankruptcy in 2016. Since that time, the company has returned over 25 million barrels of storage capacity to service and currently has more than 1,100 total workers at the Refinery site.
Shortly after acquiring the idled Refinery, which has a peak processing capacity of 650,000 barrels per day, Limetree Bay Refining began exploring opportunities for a restart. Over the ensuing two years, the company advanced the project with strong support from the administration of the Honorable Kenneth Mapp, Governor of the Virgin Islands. Earlier this year, the parties successfully negotiated a new operating agreement, which was ratified by the 32nd Legislature of the Virgin Islands on July 25, 2018 and signed into law by the Governor soon thereafter.
The restart efforts will be completed by a skilled team led by Brian Lever. Limetree Bay Terminals continues to be led by Darius Sweet, who serves as Chief Executive Officer. The company will provide storage and terminaling services for the Refinery and will continue to lease crude oil and petroleum product storage capacity to third-party customers.
For more information visit: www.lbterminals.com
8th November 2018
