Former CEO of shut refinery pursuing plant purchase
The former chief executive officer of Philadelphia Energy Solutions is seeking to purchase the 335,000 barrel-per-day PES refinery, which was shut after a June fire, the former CEO and backers of the plan said in a statement.
Philip Rinaldi, who retired from PES in 2016, formed Philadelphia Energy Industries (PEI) as a vehicle to pursue the purchase, the statement said.
“We can reinvigorate the site as an economic juggernaut that generates billions of dollars of revenue and provides thousands of high-paying jobs for our skilled professional and labor workforce,” he said in the statement.
PEI and RNG Energy Solutions, LLC have entered into a mutual cooperation agreement for the prospective development of renewable fuels and other projects together with the restart of the refinery site "should PEI be ultimately successful in its acquisition efforts," the statement said.
“My focus and drive in pursuing this acquisition is to revitalize, modernize, and develop the site and the strategic refinery business that has existed there for decades to their full potential,” said Rinaldi.
Rinaldi has spoken with the leadership of the refinery’s local union about the plan to acquire the refinery, the largest and oldest on the U.S. East Coast.
For the second time in less than two years, PES filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on July 21, exactly a month after fire and blasts destroyed an alkylation unit at the PES plant.
PES shut its final crude unit in late July, and roughly 1,000 workers were laid off without severance pay or the option for continued health insurance. (Reporting by Laila Kearney Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Bernadette Baum)
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