Grangemouth’s oil refinery has officially been announced to close. Scotland’s last refinery has been the topic of heated debate due to the announcement of its closure in the second quarter of 2025. Dating back to 1924, the refinery is the oldest in the UK.
Originally announced to be closed in November of 2023, union leaders had hoped the site’s closure would be pushed back until a greener alternative had been established, while workers said the news was a “kick in the teeth.”
The owners of the plant, Petroineos, have revealed that the plant is set to be transformed into an “import terminal and fuel distribution hub.”
It is estimated that around 400 jobs are set to be lost owing to the refinery’s closure, creating a significant loss of work for the surrounding area and its residents.
One of only six remaining in the UK, the Grangemouth plant currently fuels 65% of oil products in Scotland, including diesel and petrol.
Petroineos stated that the plant can no longer compete with larger and more modern refineries from across the UK and around the world due to the plant’s age:
“Due to its size and configuration, Grangemouth incurs high levels of capital expenditure each year just to maintain its licence to operate.
This annual outlay on essential planned maintenance and running repairs has been consistently higher than the company’s earnings over the past decade.”
Losses of up to £775 million have been reported by the company.
The company’s CEO, Franck Demay, has cited the ‘decline’ in fuel demand as a reason for the refinery’s closure.
“Demand for key fuels we produce at Grangemouth has already started to decline,”
“That reality, aligned with the cost of maintaining the refinery built half a century ago, means we are exploring ways to adapt our business.”
On BBC Radio’s Good Morning Scotland, Labour MP for Alloa and Grangemouth Brian Leishman said:
“The government should intervene at Grangemouth to extend refinery operations until the new energy industries of the future that we are going to need are ready.”
He has publicly called for the nationalisation of the refinery.
This closure announcement falls at the same time as the British government’s emergency intervention in Scunthorpe, where the country’s last remaining primary steelworks was facing shutdown.
In an effort to wind down operations, British Steel’s Scunthorpe site, which is owned by Chinese firm Jingye Group, had stopped ordering raw materials, prompting fears of an imminent closure. In response, the UK government passed the Steel Industry (Special Measures) Act 2025, which effectively took control of the site to keep it operational and protect the thousands of jobs within the site.
The lack of nationalisation of the Grangemouth site has provoked First Minister John Swinney to speak out, calling the government’s refusal to not step in and nationalise “anti-Scottish”, arguing that if the Grangemouth refinery had been located elsewhere in the UK, a similar outcome to the Scunthorpe site would have been achieved.
