This is a blockade that could weigh on the movement against pension reform. The closure of the Totalenergies refinery facilities in Normandy “began on Friday night,” the CGT secretary general of the country’s largest refinery, Alexis Antonioli, told AFP on Saturday.
Several days to close facilities
“The units have been on standby since last night,” he added. However, this closure will take several days and should not cause immediate fuel shortages at gas stations across the country.
The stoppage of shipments by the strikers causes “de facto the stoppage of the facilities”, continued Alexis Antonioli, “since the stocks are full” at the refinery site.
“Since Thursday afternoon, the strikers” present at the refinery to guarantee their safety “refused to proceed with the shipments” but “the management, not wanting to stop the refinery, decided not to provide further assistance.”
“After 22 or even 33 hours of presence of certain employees, the management ended up giving in on Friday to obtain fresh equipment” by giving instructions to stop, always according to Alexis Antonioli.
“Shipments are blocked on the refining side, which induces a different operation in the many production units,” said the group’s management, accompanied by AFP.
“Our priority is to maintain safety, which leads us to put certain units in preferential recirculation or stop some if necessary to guarantee inventory management,” added the management, which states that “other units on the platform remain in normal operation and ensure its production”.
Several sites blocked
This could not last, according to Eric Sellini, union coordinator of the group’s CGT, who specifies that “the operations (parade) are scheduled until Monday night.” He assured AFP that “nothing else comes out of the refinery.”
The closure of the Normandy refinery could be the first in a series, according to him: in addition to the PétroIneos refinery in Lavéra (Bouches-du-Rhône), whose CGT indicated on Friday that its shipments were stopped and planned to close for the Monday afternoon. “at the latest”, the Esso-ExxonMobil refinery in Port-Jérôme-Gravenchon (Seine-Maritime) could close on Monday or Tuesday, for lack of crude to refine, due to a strike at the oil depot in Le Havre.
Esso-ExxonMobil management, contacted by AFP, could not immediately be reached.
Source: BFM TV
