CEO Of Shell Finally REACTS After Oregon Governor BEGS Them To ReturnThe Honest Report
Jan 6, 2026
Four years after Shell deliberately exited West Coast refining, Oregon Governor Tina Kotek publicly urged Shell CEO Wael Sawan to reconsider the decision. His response in March 2025 left no ambiguity: Shell has no intention of returning to a region it already paid to exit.
This video breaks down how Shell sold its Puget Sound refinery in Anacortes, Washington on November 1, 2021, transferring the 149,000-barrel-per-day facility to HollyFrontier (now HF Sinclair) for $350 million, plus an additional $150–180 million in hydrocarbon inventory. The transaction marked Shell’s complete withdrawal from U.S. West Coast refining. For decades, the refinery had supplied fuel across the Pacific Northwest, including Oregon, before Shell classified it as a non-core asset and divested it as part of a broader portfolio restructuring.
We examine why Sawan’s March 2025 Capital Markets Day presentation focused entirely on expanding global LNG sales by 4–5% annually through 2030 and maintaining only a limited refining presence to support Shell’s trading operations — with no reference to re-entering divested West Coast markets.
You’ll also learn what Shell’s strategy of “performance, discipline, and simplification” actually means in practice. Sawan outlined a shift toward a capital-light business model, moving away from infrastructure-heavy assets and redirecting investment toward flexible power generation and gas-fired energy, while reducing annual capital expenditures to $20–22 billion. Re-entering West Coast refining would require an estimated $5–10 billion investment to regain access to a market Shell exited for $350 million — all while facing the same regulatory conditions that originally drove the company out.
The video also covers how HF Sinclair’s operation of the former Shell refinery led Washington State to issue a $1.3 million fine in August 2025 for hazardous-waste violations, including an 11-month delay in removing dangerous sludge from the site.
Finally, we explain why Shell’s global LNG strategy — producing roughly 29 million tons per year and selling 65.8 million tons annually, with a strong focus on Asia-Pacific markets — offers no financial justification for a multi-billion-dollar return to West Coast refining. Shell retained only fuel offtake agreements to supply branded stations in the Pacific Northwest, while completely relinquishing operational control.
The video asks a broader question: does Oregon’s decision to publicly court a global energy supermajor four years after it voted with its capital to leave reveal the depth of a state facing refinery shortages, zero in-state refining capacity, and gasoline price projections of $7–9 per gallon — as other oil majors continue to follow Shell’s 2021 exit and permanently withdraw from the West Coast market?
https://youtube.com/watch?v=pHCbmIydYMU [Embed]