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Royal Dutch Shell has said that it will continue operating its 233,000 barrel-per-day refinery in Stanlow, UK, even if talks with India's Essar Oil to sell the plant fail.

If "we cannot get the right value for the assets and do the right deal, they will be withdrawn from sale and Stanlow will be operated as a manufacturing complex within the Shell portfolio," a Shell spokesman is reported to have said in an emailed statement.

"We are not considering closure or conversion into a terminal," he added.

Shell's discussions with Essar have lasted for more than a year. The oil major's plan to sell Britain’s second-largest refinery forms part of its current strategy to push ahead with the sale of refining and retail assets at a time when the industry trend has been to focus on investing more money upstream in more lucrative oil and gas production.

Shell has been planning to sell around 15 percent of its worldwide refining capacity. In particular, it intends to reduce its involvement in refining in Europe and is also selling retail assets in Africa and Latin America on lower demand for fuels.

In May, Shell reached an agreement with Aegean Marine Petroleum Network Inc. for the sale of its Las Palmas terminal. The facility includes a lubricants plant, dedicated in-land storage facilities totalling approximately 65,000 cubic meters in capacity as well as on-site blending facilities to sell all grades of fuel oils and distillates.

Vitol Group confirmed in July that it was in exclusive negotiations with Shell Oil Products Africa for the potential acquisition of equity in their downstream businesses in 19 countries in Africa. The scope of the negotiations included Shell’s downstream businesses (Retail, Commercial Fuels, Lubricants, Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), Bitumen, Aviation and Marine) in Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt (excluding lubricants), Cote d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Togo, Senegal, Mali, Guinea, Cape Verde, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Botswana (excluding LPG), Namibia, Madagascar, Mauritius and La Reunion.

In March 2010, Shell New Zealand agreed to sell its distribution and retail businesses and a 17.1% interest in the New Zealand Refining Company.

A Shell spokesman is said to have confirmed that Shell has given Essar until the end of February to come up with a firm bid for the Stanlow refinery. The plant has been a regular product source for Shell's marine fuel operations in the Liverpool / Mersey region for a number of years.