Basell has been awarded permission by the European Commission to buy the Berre-l'Etang refinery in France from Royal Dutch Shell for US$700 million. Basell is a large, European plastics maker and provider of proprietary petrochemical process technologies. Berre-l'Etang, in southern France has a capacity of 80,000 bpd.
As per the European Commission statement, given the parties' limited position on all the upstream and downstream markets, the Commission concluded that the transaction would not strengthen either the parties' incentive or their ability to close off the market to competitors. The refinery makes petrochemical products including naphtha, jet fuel, gasoline, heating oil, bitumen, fuel oil and gasoil. Basell will also buy the infrastructure associated with the refinery, including pipelines and terminals.
06-Feb-08 
{{comment.DateTimeStampDisplay}}
{{comment.Comments}}