Green Biofuels, the largest UK supplier of hydrogenated vegetable oil (HVO), has collapsed into administration, just 20 months after BP took a 30% stake in the company.

Green Biofuels is understood to have suffered cashflow problems for some time and finally called in the administrators this week, appointing Lucy Winterborne, Kristopher Aspin and Alan Hudson of Ernst and Young-Parthenon’s turnaround and restructuring strategy team as its joint administrators.  

A spokeswoman for the joint administrators told MT: “The company has entered administration as it had insufficient funds to continue trading. The joint administrators intend to continue to trade the business whilst they seek purchasers for the business and assets of the company.”

The collapse of Green Biofuels has raised eyebrows in the market, coming less than two years after BP sunk a significant stake into the company, in February 2022.

At the time BP hailed Green Biofuels as being at the “forefront of HVO supply” in the UK market. adding that the investment was part of its strategy to expand its biofuels portfolio, which also saw the oil giant acquire 28.57% acquisition in Gasrec at the end of 2021.

A BP spokeswoman told MT that Green Biofuels had suffered from “cash flow issues”. She added: “We are a minority shareholder in Green Biofuels and we spent a lot of time and dedicated substantial effort to support them - we worked intensively with them - and we will be supporting the administrators in carrying out their statutory duties and assessing all options.”

She continued: “We are continuing to supply the company with HVO as they are still trading right now and have customers to supply.”

A Green Biofuels spokeswoman told MT: “Green Biofuels is open for business as usual, as is our Irish subsidiary. We continue to trade with our conscientious partners and meet the high demand for our advanced Gd+HVO, a fossil free alternative to dirty diesel.

“As an organisation with a nine-year track record of strong growth, we expect the future will be bright for many more years to come. Our planet has an immediate need for low-carbon, low-cost fuels and GBF’s advanced HVO products offer a ready solution.”

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