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A Wild Wednesday at the Fuel Oil News Distributor Debate
Our first speaker was Andrew Owens (1), co-founder of Greenergy in the early 1990s, a company which now supplies over a quarter of all the road fuels in Britain. To better support the country’s growing import demand, Greenergy has both acquired, and made significant investment in, GB terminals. With the prospect of two thirds of our diesel needing to be imported in the future, Andrew asked the pertinent question Can the UK survive without refineries?
With its Lindsey refinery, Total UK operates one of the UK’s 7 remaining refineries. Networking with a rather rain soaked David Hodge (6) of Lancashire-based Ribble Fuel Oils was Total UK commercial sales manager, Dominic Hewitt who found the day ‘very interesting.’
Phillips 66 still operates the Humber refinery, Pete George, managing director of the company’s UK & Ireland marketing, reported this Distributor Debate to have been ‘very informative’. With Pete George (3) are on his right, Janet Kettlewell of Kettlewell Fuels, one of the more recent distributors to join the Jet branded fold, and Karen McBride and Richard Billington from Certas Energy.
Instructing the audience on the impact of issues in the wider oil world was Mystic Mog the Portland cat. James Spencer’s (4) entertaining presentation was much appreciated by the audience and particularly ‘thought provoking’ for Rod Prowse of Marathon Associates.
Distributors and speakers had travelled far and wide to attend the event, among them Marcus Jones (5) from Anglesey-based TR Jones and Sandra Morris from Chester-based Wirral Fuels, pictured with Ken Taylor, OAMPS.
By 2015 it is possible that oil heating could be eradicated – OFTEC director general, Jeremy Hawksley (2) made a plea for distributors to get behind the Oilsave campaign, a joint initiative with the FPS. FPS president Mark Nolan (7) of Nolan Oils, seen among many familiar faces, was spurred on by Jeremy’s call to fight for oil heating and is actively promoting the campaign in the distributor community.
Julia Mansfield of Fuel Additive Science Technologies provided a highly informative insight into kerosene supply and quality. Taking a look at the impact of the imminent launch of the Renewable Heat Incentive, Paul Stephen, editor of Renewable Energy Installer, explained the challenges and the possibilities for oil heating. Endeavouring to give a business a more competitive edge, Fuelsoft’s David Kingsman and Kan’to’s, Dimitri Papaioannou discussed the benefits of customer relationship management software and enhanced real time tank telemetry respectively.
To help better prepare for future events, Fuel Oil News welcomes feedback from those who attended to jane@fueloilnews.co.uk.