Tosco buys Ireland's sole refinery

The Irish government yesterday announced it had agreed the sale of the state-owned Irish National Petroleum Corp (INPC) to U.S. oil company Tosco Corp for $100 million.

Irish public enterprise minister Mary O'Rourke said the sale agreement, signed at the weekend, was subject to legislative and regulatory approval, with formal completion expected in six to seven weeks.

"INPC is a small player in a large multinational market," O'Rourke said in a statement. "The board of INPC has advised me that the future lies within a large petroleum corporation."

The minister said INPC needed significant investment to respond to the growing demands for environmentally friendly fuels. Tosco, whose $7 billion all-stock sale to Phillips Petroleum Co was announced earlier this year, had the financial muscle "to meet INPC's investment requirements going forward," she said.

The U.S. company will take over INPC's Whitegate refinery, in Cork Harbour, southern Ireland, and Whiddy Island oil terminal at Bantry, on the southwest coast.

Tosco has agreed to maintain INPC's terminal and refinery operations for 15 years, and to maintain existing jobs and conditions at the plants, which employ more than 400 people. The government said the sale of INPC would end the so-called "mandatory regime", a levy of 0.004 Irish pounds per litre charged to petrol consumers, which provided around 14.5 million Irish pounds ($15.82 million) per year in financial support for the Whitegate refinery.