WHAT an eye-opener Monday’s article by Kenny MacAskill was (There’s truth and there’s spin about Grangemouth, Apr 8). He reports that the Grangemouth oil refinery made a profit of £100 million in 2022 and probably more in 2023, and would make much more money once the hydrocracker was sorted with a green transition some time in the future to protect jobs and the environment.
The UK Government maintains it is loss-making and wants it closed, leaving Scotland as the only major oil producer without a refinery. To add insult to injury, the UK is weirdly prepared to give hundreds of millions to Ineos, the owners, to invest in a new refinery in Belgium.
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Comparisons with Norway spring to mind yet again. The Norwegians have a publicly owned, modern refinery at their biggest port, Mongstad, with a refining capacity of 12 million tonnes a year. One conclusion that can be drawn is that the UK Government wants to weaken Scotland before independence. Surely fighting the closure of our refinery here in Scotland is a cause all Scots can get behind.
Susan Grant
Tain
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