Refinery to refined fuels import terminal conversion
Energy / oil and gas
Client: UK refinery and fuels terminal operator
Programme value: ~£50m
Project period: 2024-26
Setting: live COMAH site
The challenge
Following the end of refining operations in 2025, the site had to be converted into a refined fuels import terminal. The work ran on a live, safety-critical COMAH site while redundant refinery plant was decommissioned and demolished at the same time.
What Manero did
- Project management and engineering leadership across multiple specialist contract teams
- Complex brownfield modifications to gasoline, kerosene and diesel process systems
- Storage tank overhauls in accordance with API and EEMUA standards
- Commissioning of new terminal systems alongside continuing site operations
- Coordination of concurrent decommissioning and demolition of redundant refinery equipment
How we worked
Embedded project management · Owner-side engineering · Contract team leadership · CDM 2015
Outcome
- Two-year programme delivered in a live COMAH environment without compromising site safety standards
- Full statutory compliance maintained throughout, covering CDM 2015, COMAH and environmental requirements
- Site knowledge carried forward into an ongoing flexible support arrangement with the terminal
Why this is relevant
Sustained owner-side project leadership on a complex brownfield site where production, construction and demolition all run at the same time.
Site mothballing, decommissioning and tender management
Biofuels / decommissioning
Client: UK biodiesel producer
Scope: operating projects, mothballing and decommissioning
Role: CDM Principal Designer
Regulators: SEPA / APHA
The challenge
The work built on first-hand knowledge of the plant, gained delivering process and plant improvement projects on the site while it was in full production.
When biodiesel production ceased, the owner needed the process plant held safely and compliantly while the future of the site was decided. It then needed a full decontamination and decommissioning strategy taken to the market.
What Manero did
- Mothballing strategy developed in accordance with CDM 2015 and SEPA, APHA and Scottish Water requirements
- Redundant In Situ (RIS) maintenance strategy implemented to hold dormant plant safely and at low cost
- Ongoing compliance maintained against the legacy PPC permit and APHA obligations
- Decontamination and decommissioning strategy developed in line with SEPA and APHA guidance
- Full contractor tender managed: scope development, tender issue and commercial evaluation
How we worked
Operating plant projects · Fractional project management · Owner-side engineering · CDM Principal Designer · Tender management
Outcome
- Dormant plant held in a safe, compliant and low-cost condition through an extended transition period
- A single point of accountability from concept through to contractor selection and mobilisation
- Site transition progressed into due diligence and handover to an incoming owner
Why this is relevant
Continuity from an operating biofuels plant to decommissioning: project delivery while the site ran, then regulatory, maintenance and commercial responsibility held for an owner with no remaining site team.