Limetree Bay To Restart Oil Refining On St. Croix Late 2019

ST. CROIX — Limetree Bay Ventures announced Wednesday that it expects to bring its new single point mooring (SPM) buoy into service in October and to re-commence refining operations by the end of 2019. Additionally, the company announced the promotion of Brian Lever to president and chief executive officer.

Limetree Bay owns a world-class refinery, storage terminal and deepwater port facility on St. Croix — the former HOVENSA oil refinery that shuttered in 2012. Following an agreement reached by the Mapp administration and ratified by the 32nd Legislature in 2018, Limetree Bay — which previously reached a separate deal with the Mapp administration in 2015 for the purchase of the facility to start an oil storage business — agreed to restart oil refining by early 2020. With the announcement of oil refining restart by late this year, it appears Limetree Bay has made great strides in its effort to restore a facility that was inactive for six years prior to restart work.

Limetree Bay said today that it continues to make significant investments to revitalize the facility as an environmentally compliant, multi- purpose energy center, which conducts large-scale refining operations and provides third-party storage service for crude oil and refined petroleum products. Upon completion of its ongoing refinery restart project, Limetree Bay said it will be able to process approximately 200,000 barrels per day of feedstock.

Mr. Lever, the company’s new president and CEO, has more than 40 years of experience in refining, storage and logistics infrastructure, Limetree Bay said. Mr. Lever is now responsible for leading the combined refinery and terminal organization.

Prior to joining Limetree Bay in August 2018, Mr. Lever held senior roles at Conoco Phillips and Hess Corporation. Most recently, Mr. Lever has overseen the refinery restart planning, organizational development, and pre- commissioning efforts.

“Limetree is focused on recruiting the strongest refinery and terminal operations team in the industry,” said Mr. Lever. “Our management additions over the last year are a testimony to the compelling nature of our business plan as we complete the SPM buoy and refinery restart projects.”

Under the new organizational structure, Robert Weldzius will continue to provide day-to-day oversight for the refinery. Mr. Weldzius joined Limetree Bay as senior vice president of refining in January. He is said to have deep operational experience with over 40 years in refining, serving as vice president of Salt Lake City Refining for Andeavor immediately prior to joining Limetree.

To lead the marine terminal business and operations, Limetree Bay has recently hired Jeffrey Hersperger as senior vice president of terminals. Mr. Hersperger was previously general manager at Kinder Morgan, where he was responsible for the company’s liquids business throughout the Gulf Coast. Limetree Bay said Mr. Hersperger has deep experience as a general manager of large-scale merchant terminals focused on safe and efficient, customer-oriented operations.

With these and other senior leaders, Limetree Bay said it has put in place an experienced team ready for the significant increase in activity that will result from completion of its ongoing projects.