Gulf Refinery, Milford Haven


The Gulf Refinery at Milford Haven was an oil refinery situated on the Pembrokeshire coast in Wales. The refinery, originally owned by Gulf Oil, was opened in August 1968 by Queen Elizabeth II. The plant, constructed at a cost of approximately £35 million, produced a range of petroleum products and occupied an area of 300 acres. Up to of oil could be processed a day at the facility.
Gulf Oil's crude oil was principally obtained from Nigeria and Kuwait through joint ventures with BP. Crude was shipped to Bantry Bay in Ireland in 312,000 DWT ships. From there it was shipped in 100,000 DWT ships to Gulf's refineries in Milford Haven, Denmark and Rotterdam. The Milford Haven refinery was integrated with a petro-chemical plant, using oil products from the refinery as feed-stock for the chemical plant. It employed about 280 people. About 23 per cent of the refinery output was exported by train via a rail link to the national rail network. About 75 per cent of the output was exported by ship.
Gulf Oil's refinery also supplied fuel oil to the nearby oil-fired 2,000 MW Pembroke power station.
The refining distillation capacity over the operational life of the refinery was as follows.
YearCapacity
19694.0
19725.0
19745.0
19755.0
19795.0
19854.625
19905.3
19955.6

Gulf Oil merged with Standard Oil of California in 1985 with both rebranded as Chevron. The refinery closed down in December 1997, as part of plans by the Chevron Corporation, by then the owners of Gulf Oil, to withdraw from the downstream oil business in the UK. Today, the site is occupied by the SemLogistics oil depot and the Dragon LNG terminal.