Ineos

This article is part of the Spinwatch Fracking Portal and project

Ineos is a major chemicals company and a 50 per cent owner of the Grangemouth refinery in Scotland. It is part of the Ineos Group, a privately owned multinational chemicals company headquartered in Rolle, Switzerland, with its registered office in Lyndhurst, United Kingdom. British billionaire Jim Ratcliffe is the founder, chairman and main shareholder.

Sometimes described as 'the biggest company you've never heard of', Ineos has more than 80 separate firms registered at the UK Companies House. It is the largest privately owned company in the UK. In 2013 the Group's turnover was £43 billion.

Since 2014 Ineos has made substantial investments in shale gas exploration in the UK, buying up licences from BG Group and IGas Energy, making it the UK's third largest shale explorer.

In July 2016 Ineos announced it intended to accelerate UK shale gas development by lodging over the next six months as many as 30 planning applications to drill test fracking wells in the north of England early next year. It said it hoped to begin extracting gas within 18 months.

Tom Crotty said he believed that once drilling started, people would 'see [fracking] is not the Frankenstein monster they thought it was'. According to the Financial Times, 'he was confident that recent changes to rules allowing ministers to intervene if local councils delay granting permission would finally lead to Ineos drilling test wells'. Until permission was granted, he admitted it 'would continue to be “difficult” to convince critics'.

Ineos also announced it would end a six-year tax exile with the opening of a new headquarters in London for its mainly UK-based upstream oil and gas businesses.

Background

INEOS Group is the fourth largest chemicals company in the world measured by revenues (after BASF, Dow Chemical and LyondellBasell). It employs over 15,000 employees at 51 manufacturing plants in 11 countries.

In the UK:

INEOS Group own and run major plant at Runcorn (chlorine and caustic soda, used in many products – pharmaceuticals, synthetic fibres, bleach, water purification etc), Grangemouth in Scotland (two high energy ‘crackers’ to produce commodity chemicals used in fuels, solvents, nylon, packaging etc) and have plants based at Seal Sands, near and linked to the Wilton cluster, in the North East.

It co-owns Grangemouth with PetroChina. In July 2014 Ineos received a UK government loan guarantee to build Europe’s largest ethane storage tank at Grangemouth. The following month Ineos bought the rights to explore fracking for shale gas in a 127 square mile area around Grangemouth and the Firth of Forth.

In August 2015 Ineos Upstream was awarded a further three blocks (SK45, SK48 and SK58a) by the UK government in its first tranche of the 14th onshore licensing round.

The move into shale gas

Views

INEOS' website has a lengthy article outlining its views on Europe's 'dithering' in the debate over shale gas exploration and production. It believes that action to facilitate shale gas production in the UK is imperative or chemical production in other regions, particularly the US, will gain such a competitive advantage that UK production will become uneconomic.

The firm plans to use imported US shale-derived feedstock in their chemical plants at Grangemouth. INEOS is one of very few companies able to use shale gas as both a fuel and a feedstock.

INEOS has decided it cannot wait, and has struck a deal with the US to bring US raw materials to its European plants to maintain a competitive global Olefins & Polymers business. From 2015 INEOS Olefins & Polymers in Norway will begin taking ‘shipments of US-derived ethane – an essential ingredient necessary to produce ethylene.

INEOS warned in a report to the House of Lords EU sub-committee 'that rising energy costs threaten to undermine the ability of manufacturers in the EU to compete on the world stage'. Chemical industries that rely heavily on fossil fuels to run its plants were 'particularly at risk' it said.

'We are acutely vulnerable to fluctuations in energy prices,' said Tom Crotty, INEOS' group director. 'We sell our products in fiercely competitive international markets and cannot pass on costs to our customers. But we cannot afford to operate in jurisdictions with uncompetitive energy prices.'

INEOS believes that Europe 'should shield energy-hungry industries from steep price rises' while it moves towards creating affordable low-carbon energy sources.

'If it doesn’t, production will be forced out of Europe to more competitive locations which will mean the loss of jobs, investment and tax revenue,' he said. Decarbonisation should not mean deindustrialisation, said Tom. 'The aim must be to connect industry to green energy supplies, not push industry away,” he added. He said energy-intensive industries were not ‘sunset industries’ standing in the way of environmental improvements. 'They are actually a vital source of raw materials and innovations required to make the green economy a reality,' he said.

Buying up shale exploration licences

In August 2014 Ineos made its first move into onshore shale gas exploration in the UK, buying from BG Group a 51 per cent share of a shale licence covering 329 square km of the Midland Valley in Scotland, which includes the area around the Grangemouth refining and petrochemical complex. Dart Energy (now owned by IGas Energy) owned the other 49 per cent however in March 2015 Ineos announced it was buying IGas's stake in the shale licence around the Grangemouth plant, thus giving it full ownership of the site.

In March 2015 IGas agreed a deal with chemicals giant Ineos to sell it at least a 50% interest in seven of IGas’ shale gas licences in the North West along with the option to acquire a 20% interest in two further IGas licences in the East Midlands. The deal is worth £30 million in cash and a further £138 million committment to fund a two phase work programme to develop the sites.

Ineos also pledged an extra £138m to help IGas expand its shale gas operations in the North West and East Midlands regions in England.

Meetings on shale gas with UK government ministers and officials

• Stephen Lovegrove, DECC Permanent Secretary met with Jim Ratcliffe on 28 June 2013 at 3 Whitehall Place. The government's briefing notes described Ratcliffe as 'very well connected and has had a number of meetings with Ministers in various Departments and with Jeremy Heywood'. A section discussing INEOS' potential activities in shale gas was redacted from the briefing note. This meeting appeared to have been suggested to Lovegrove at a 'recent Lancastrian dinner' (held in April 2013). The focus of the meeting was 'primarily... about shale gas and the importance of supporting its development' in the UK.
• Duarte Figueira (Energy Development) Head of the UK Office of Unconventional Gas and Oil - with Ineos chairman Jim Ratcliffe attended the same meeting above.
• Jeremy Heywood, September 2014 met with unnamed representative of INEOS for a 'discussion on shale gas'.
• James Wharton, minister for the Northern Powerhouse met with INEOS in September 2015

Chemical industry meetings with Ministers

• Michael Fallon, in November 2013 Ineos met with the BIS minister as part of a wider group 'to discuss chemical industries'. This included Contract Chemicals, Chemical Industries Association, Huntsman, Synthomer, European Chemical Industry Council (CEFIC), Dow, Thomas Swan and Company, Croda, Verband der Chemischen Industrie e.V., Solvay, Growhow, Ineos, BASF.

Fracking in Scotland

In 2015 Ineos launched a 'Scottish shale gas community engagement programme' to help tackle the opposition that has emerged against fracking in the region. Its campaign was engineered to show people that fracking technology was safe and how the process would bring about huge economic benefits to local people.

The petrochemical company's sudden concern for the nation's economic performance was considered somewhat perplexing, given the Grangemouth controversy that had erupted just a few months earlier, when Ineos chose to keep its plant shut despite the cancellation of the planned strikes - actions that saw it accused of holding Scotland 'to ransom'.

Scotland has had a moratorium on shale gas, coal bed methane and underground coal gasification since 2015. In June 2016 when the Scottish Parliament voted for a permanent ban Ineos responded by stating that the vote made little difference.

The vote this evening changes very little. A process remains in place in Scotland to further assess scientific, evidence based research before a decision is taken on fracking.

This has important implications for the people of Scotland and its economy and should not be prejudged before it has reached its conclusion. INEOS has been clear that it believes shale gas can be extracted safely and that Scotland is losing out as the centre of excellence moves south.

We are focused on England where we believe that shale can provide much needed jobs, investment and energy security.”

Meetings with ministers

• 28 January 2015 - First minister Nicola Sturgeon met with INEOS chairman Jim Ratcliffe on the same day that energy minister Fergus Ewing announced a Scottish moratorium on fracking.

PR films countering anti-fracking concerns

• INEOS, Fracking facts water contamination: 'Some campaigners claim fracking leads to water contamination. That is not the case. This video explains the facts.' Published on Youtube May 2016.

Legal action against Chinese companies over misuse of trade secrets

In March 2014 Ineos announced it was taking legal action against a number of Sinopec and Sinopec subsidiaries (SNEC, Anqing and others) for breach of contract and/or misuse of trade secrets.

INEOS says that Sinopec Ningbo Engineering Company has broken a long established technology agreement which, together with trade secret misuse by other Sinopec companies, has enabled development of a series of new world scale Acrylonitrile plants without INEOS agreement or consent. INEOS, which has otherwise excellent relationships with Sinopec and with China, has no choice other than to protect its intellectual property. INEOS fears that these breaches of rights will cause major harm to its Acrylonitrile business which generates up to $500m per annum of profit and has a replacement value of $3 billion. It supports around 5,000 direct and indirect jobs in the USA and Europe.

Affiliations

• All Party Parliamentary Group on Unconventional Oil and Gas - Ineos is an associate member and has so far contributed £10,000, which was registered in June 2013. It is also a member of the 'independent advisory panel'.
• Parliamentary and Scientific Committee (an Associate Parliamentary Group)

People

• Jim Ratcliffe - founder and chairman
• Tom Crotty - INEOS group and external affairs director
• Calum MacLean - a founder member of INEOS in 1998 and chairman O&P Europe and chief executive officer O&P Europe (UK) since 2011
• Andrew McLachlan - senior account director
• Peter Rose - business development director, speaker at ShaleWorld UK conference
• Gary Haywood, CEO of INEOS Upstream and in charge of leading the company’s fracking plans
• Patrick Erwin, commercial director of Ineos Upstream, leading on commercial strategy, developing partnerships and on asset purchase - led the economics and work programme parts of for INEOS’s application to the 14th Onshore Licensing Round.
• John McNally, chief executive of Ineos’s UK petrochemicals arm

• David East, communications manager

Lobbying and PR firms

External

• Burson-Marsteller (B-M) took over the Ineos account in July 2014 from Portcullis Public Affairs who had retained it for several years. Freedom of information requests reveal that B-M has set up meetings with UK government ministers for INEOS
• PPS Group provides public affairs advice to Ineos Enterprises Ltd (2014-2015)
• Media Zoo’s UK media relations and reputation management brief includes communicating with trade organisations and governments in the US and Germany, which are key markets for Ineos. Creative director Mark Killick works on the Ineos account. along with Andrew McLachlan and Hannah Brandstaetter
• Edelman

Internal

• Richard Longden (INEOS)

Resources

• Letter to the Editor Ineos, tax and China, The Guardian, Monday 21 October 2013 21.00 BST
• Nick Mathiason, Ineos tax deal sparks fury as firm plans move to Switzerland, theguardian.com, Thursday 4 March 2010 21.05 GMT

Freedom of information requests

• Letter regarding FOI request on INEOS introductory meeting with DECC Permanent Secretary June 2013, Office of Unconventional Gas and Oil (OUGO), dated 27 January 2014, acc 5 May 2014
• Emails, Email exchanges of 30th June between Ineos and DECC Officials. Briefing material for 28th June Meeting 3. Email exchanges between Ineos and DECC Officials

Contact

Website: http://www.ineos.com/

Twitter: @INEOS_Upstream

London address: 38 Hans Cres, London SW1X 0LZ

Resources

See: Fracking lobbying firms

See: Fracking Spads

• Melissa Jones and Andy Rowell, Access all areas: Westminster's (vast) fracking lobby exposed, 29 April 2015.
• US shale gas plan to make Grangemouth profitable, The Telegraph, 2 September 2013
• Simon Goodley, firm Ineos accused of ‘bribes and bulldozers’ approach to fracking, The Guardian, 28 September 2014