There is no credible bid for the Grangemouth oil refinery, and no prospect of saving it from closure next year, MSPs have been told.

In the first time Petroineos bosses have spoken publicly to the Scottish Parliament’s economy committee, they said the plant was losing £385,000 a day.

There has been no sign of government intervention to keep it open after next spring.

In September, PetroIneos announced that Grangemouth, one of the world’s oldest oil refineries, would close in spring 2025, costing almost three thousand direct and supply chain jobs.

On Wednesday, it became clear there wasn’t much hope of changing that.

“What would have to happen for there to be a break, which I think is what most people are looking for?” » asked Michelle Thomson, vice-chair of the committee.

Iain Hardie, head of legal and external affairs at Petroineos, responded: “We owe it to our shareholders, we owe it to our employees and we owe it to our customers to ensure we have a robust action plan in place to ensure that we can move smoothly from a refinery to a terminal, and that’s what we’re doing.

Grangemouth will move from refining oil for petrol and diesel pumps across Scotland to importing it from the Netherlands and storing it – essentially becoming Scotland’s petrol station.

Petroineos said there was no buyer, nor prospect of government intervention, and that work to transform the refinery into a biofuels plant was years away.

MPs will hear from Unite, the union representing most Grangemouth workers, next week.

Unite wants the Scottish and UK governments to intervene.

Scottish Secretary Ian Murray and Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes sign the £100m Falkirk and Grangemouth Growth deal on Thursday.

Unite wants both governments to invest £100m a year to keep Grangemouth going a little longer.

The union said this would be far better than the estimated £400m economic loss to Scotland in the event of a lockdown.

Petroineos believes this stage has already been passed and that by June next year the Grangemouth oil refinery will close.

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