The refinery, originally owned and operated by Gulf Oil, was opened in August 1968 by Queen Elizabeth II.

[1] The plant, constructed at a cost of approximately £35 million, produced a range of petroleum products and occupied an area of 300 acres (121.4 ha).

[2] It was initially designed to process 60,000 barrels of crude oil per day (3 million tonnes per year).

The Bantry Bay facility had a storage capacity of one million tonnes.

The refinery closed down in December 1997, as part of plans by the Chevron Corporation, by then the owners of Gulf Oil, to withdraw from the downstream oil business in the UK.