Page 34 - FINAL Phillips 66 50 Year Book

before moving to Conoco. Married with three children, he was a Fellow
of the Institute of Petroleum. By 1971, when the article was printed,
Conoco had eight custom-built refineries around the globe.

It had been a whirlwind few years, and not just here in the UK.
The construction of the Humber Refinery saw the S&D (Supply &
Distribution) Division change strategy, from acquisition to rationalisation
– concentrating on the economics of distribution and maximising profits
derived from exchange deals based on the refinery’s production.

Already some important exchanges between the UK, north-west Europe
and Scandinavia had been realised with other major oil companies,
achieving economies of freight as well as increased flexibility through
the reciprocal use of terminals. In 1970 itself, Conoco’s product
requirement in Europe was about 140,000 barrels a day - and 60 per Above: Construction safety has significantly changed over the years.
cent of this came from the Humber Refinery.

History was being made at a rate of knots. In January 1971, a first in
maritime history occurred when the first cargo of crude oil was offloaded
through the Tetney monobuoy – Britain’s first offshore mooring
monobuoy moored 2.5 miles out in the River Humber.

The 120-ton steel structure, the first of its kind in Europe, was made in
Holland. The realisation of a project which took three years of work by
personnel at Conoco Europe’s Engineering Centre.

The shallow waters of the Humber Estuary make it impossible for fully-
laden supertankers to come alongside the refinery’s nearest port,
Immingham. Initially it was considered feasible to dig a deep trench

Above: Duct work being lifted into place.
Right: Intricate scaffolding on the Bottom Floor Slab Construction
S5602.