George Powell

Nov 17, 2024 | northwestbylines.co.uk | George Powell

On Wednesday 25 September 2024, Essar Energy Transition (EET) opened the doors to its oil refinery in Stanlow, Ellesmere Port, providing a tour of the refinery for ex-workers. Luckily, I managed to find myself on one of the coaches heading through the gates of the petrochemical plant. While on site, I joined a guided tour of the processing plants, and learned the role each would have in the upcoming transition, as the refinery process switches from being powered by fuel oil to hydrogen gas.

Nov 1, 2024 | statmagazine.org | Pete Mercer |George Powell |Tilly Foulkes |Julian Cowley

STAT MAGAZINEA culture zine for the North-West of England.

Oct 29, 2024 | statmagazine.org | George Powell

When I worked in MediaCity, it always felt a bit odd that there were hardly any pigeons knocking about. There were surely enough crumbs left by office workers eating lunch away from their cubicles to attract them – and plenty of nooks and crannies in the buildings for them to nest in. I asked around. I heard whispers that no pigeons was no accident. I was told that, amongst the steel and glass modernist high- rises, there’s a mercenary hired by the landowners to kill the rock dove descendants.

Jun 28, 2024 | northwestbylines.co.uk | George Powell

Stanlow, once estuary marshland, has been home to various heavy industries over the last two centuries. The most striking of all is arguably Stanlow Oil Refinery, which changed hands from Shell UK to Essar Oil UK (recently rebranded as EET Fuels) in 2011. Throughout its history though, people living next to it have always wondered; what are we breathing in? Unfortunately, we’re still no closer to knowing.