Energy driving the Humber

The Hum­ber Refin­ery is one of the most com­plex refiner­ies oper­at­ed in Europe and its vast range of prod­ucts includes not only fuel – it pro­duces some 14 mil­lion litres a day, some of which is sold at our 330 JET petrol sta­tions – but raw mate­ri­als that are trans­formed into every­thing from plas­tics to toi­letries. Some 20 per cent of all UK petro­le­um prod­ucts come from the facil­i­ty.

The con­tri­bu­tion goes much fur­ther than the local econ­o­my. Since 2000, Phillips 66, with the Hum­ber Refin­ery as its eco­nom­ic engine, has paid more than £550 mil­lion in tax to the Trea­sury, and col­lects over £4 bil­lion in duty and VAT annu­al­ly. The com­bined eco­nom­ic con­tri­bu­tion of Hum­ber Refin­ery and oth­er local indus­tries means that North Lin­colnshire is the only coun­cil area in the coun­try to pay more to cen­tral gov­ern­ment than it receives.

Lord Hask­ins, chair of Hum­ber Local Enter­prise Part­ner­ship, is cer­tain about the Hum­ber Refinery’s val­ue to the region. “The growth of the ‘ener­gy estu­ary’ has been one of the most pos­i­tive region­al devel­op­ments in the UK, with the Hum­ber Refin­ery a long­stand­ing anchor around which oth­er invest­ments con­tin­ue to emerge,” he says.

“Hum­ber­side right­ly has a strong rep­u­ta­tion as a major con­trib­u­tor to the future of ener­gy in this coun­try.”

The Hum­ber Refin­ery is a long­stand­ing anchor around which oth­er invest­ments con­tin­ue to emerge

As well as keep­ing the UK mov­ing today, Phillips 66 is keen to cap­ture oppor­tu­ni­ties in the low-car­bon econ­o­my of tomor­row. Work­ing with the Depart­ment for Trans­port and the Envi­ron­ment Agency, we have suc­cess­ful­ly tri­alled mak­ing high-per­form­ing, advanced bio­fu­els from waste in the refinery’s process units. How­ev­er, and this may seem a para­dox, one the most excit­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties lies in the elec­tric vehi­cle rev­o­lu­tion.

One of the prod­ucts pro­duced by the com­plex is high-grade petro­le­um coke, a car­bon-rich residue that remains when oth­er, lighter mate­ri­als are refined from crude oil. Petro­le­um coke from the Hum­ber com­plex already has a vital role in sup­port­ing advanced man­u­fac­tur­ing in the steel recy­cling and alu­mini­um smelt­ing indus­tries.

Now Phillips 66 Hum­ber per­son­nel, togeth­er with their R&D staff from the Unit­ed States and bat­tery mak­ers in Chi­na, have devel­oped unique coke for­mu­la­tions suit­able for use in smart­phone and elec­tric vehi­cle bat­ter­ies.

Phillips 66 is already export­ing graphite coke for bat­tery pro­duc­tion to coun­tries such as Chi­na, but UK-based bat­tery and elec­tric vehi­cle pro­duc­tion would allow more sig­nif­i­cant eco­nom­ic ben­e­fits and val­ue to remain in the UK. We are keen to work with the gov­ern­ment, Inno­vate UK and oth­er busi­ness­es to help estab­lish a UK-based sup­ply chain for elec­tric vehi­cles, start­ing with pre­cur­sors such as petro­le­um coke and fin­ish­ing with com­plete bat­ter­ies and, ide­al­ly, com­plete vehi­cles.

The refin­ery has more than 50 pro­duc­tion units and over 1,000 miles of pipes. It is kept hum­ming by the vital con­tri­bu­tion of our 1,100 work­ers and we are invest­ing to make sure they have the skills for the future. As well as part­ner­ships with local col­leges, there is a four-year appren­tice­ship scheme.

The refin­ery is proud to employ dou­ble the nation­al aver­age of female engi­neers and, under the new gen­der pay report­ing, our UK organ­i­sa­tion report­ed no dis­cernible hourly pay gap between men and women as of April 5, 2017.

Zoe Spar­ling, a grad­u­ate of the refin­ery appren­tice­ship pro­gramme, is one of the next gen­er­a­tion of work­ers play­ing a part in the ener­gy tran­si­tion. She says: “When I joined the com­pa­ny, I felt con­fi­dent I was work­ing some­where with a clear plan for the future. We want to con­tin­ue to play a lead­ing role in ener­gy and trans­port for the long term – and I’m excit­ed to be involved in that.”

Dar­ren Cun­ning­ham, lead exec­u­tive UK  and gen­er­al man­ag­er of the Hum­ber Refin­ery, adds: “We are excit­ed about our future and are lucky to have a fan­tas­tic team here at the refin­ery, with excep­tion­al skills and capa­bil­i­ties. The refin­ery will con­tin­ue to sup­ply the prod­ucts need­ed today and long into the future.

“From our qui­et posi­tion on the estu­ary, we at Phillips 66 Hum­ber Refin­ery are com­mit­ted to con­tin­u­ing our role as a major play­er, pro­vid­ing ener­gy and improv­ing the lives of the pub­lic, cus­tomers and com­mu­ni­ties we serve.”

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phillips66.co.uk