OREANDA-NEWS. March 22, 2011. London-listed Essar Energy on Monday said it expects to sign by the month-end a deal to acquire Royal Dutch Shell’s Stanlow refinery in northwest England for USD 350 million. The company, announcing its financial results for 2010 full year, in a press statement, said it “expects to sign the deal to acquire Stanlow, the UK’s second largest refinery, from Shell by March 31”.“Acquisition price will be USD 350 million plus inventory at cost price,” said Essar. Essar had on February 18 announced acquisition of the Stanlow refinery to make the Ruias-promoted firm the first Indian refiner with “truely global footprint”. Essar owns a refinery at Vadinar, Gujarat which can process 2,80,000 barrels of crude oil per day. It also owns a 90,000-bpd unit in Kenya and is expanding Vadinar to 4,00,000 bpd. Stanlow has a nameplate capacity of 2,96,000 bpd but currently operates at 2,20,000 bpd.