Normany Platform (Photo archives) | Source: Le Courrier Gauchois (Sep 18, 2023)
The Gonfreville platform is TotalEnergies' largest industrial site in France and one of its biggest globally, located in Gonfreville-l'Orcher, Normandy (Seine-Maritime), adjacent to the Port of Le Havre. The refinery and petrochemical plant have been formally operated as a single integrated platform since January 2013, allowing deep feedstock and utility synergies. Together, they convert 12 million metric tons/year of crude oil into approximately 200 finished products exported to over 60 countries.
Historical Overview
The Gonfreville-l'Orcher refinery traces its origins to 1924, when the French government, under Prime Minister Poincaré, created the Compagnie Française des Pétroles (CFP) to defend France's petroleum interests in the Middle East. CFP subsequently founded the Compagnie Française de Raffinage (CFR) in 1929 — with State participation of 10% — and immediately programmed construction of two refineries, including the Raffinerie de Normandie at Gonfreville-l'Orcher, sited on 150 hectares conceded by the Port Autonome du Havre on land formerly used as an artillery testing range for the Schneider arms factory.
Construction began in June 1931 and the refinery entered service on 1 May 1933, initially processing Iraqi crude with a capacity of 800,000 Mt/year, later expanded to 1.5 Mt/year within its second construction phase. The Second World War caused severe destruction: in June 1940, retreating French forces torched the storage park and the sole surviving distillation unit was dismantled and removed by German forces; the refinery resumed operations only from 9 July 1946. Post-war reconstruction coincided with explosive demand growth — French petroleum consumption multiplied twelvefold between 1950 and 1974 — driving successive expansions that pushed annual throughput to a peak of 23.3 Mt/year in 1972.
The petrochemical complex was established separately in 1971, when Elf Atochem and Total formed the joint venture Ato Chimie in equal shares to valorize refinery by-products, commissioning a polymer plant — initially producing LDPE by high-pressure tubular process — which entered service in May 1972. A polypropylene unit followed in 1975, and polystyrene shortly thereafter, with total polymer output reaching 15% of France's mass-market plastics by the late 1970s. The petrochemical entity changed legal identity several times — from Ato Chimie to Elf Atochem (1983), Atofina (1992), then Total Petrochemicals — before adopting its current identity as TotalEnergies Petrochemicals France SA. The refinery and petrochemical plant were formally merged into a single integrated platform in January 2013, unlocking deep feedstock and utility synergies.
Refinery
The refinery has a Nelson Complexity Index (NCI) of 7.57, reflecting a sophisticated conversion configuration. Its crude distillation capacity is 253,000 b/d (≈12 Mt/year), representing approximately 12% of France's total refining capacity.
Key Process Units & Capacities
Key Products
Gasoline, diesel, kerosene/jet fuel (including SAF since March 2022), lubricating oils, and naphtha as petrochemical feedstock. The site also hosts the Osilub used-oil regeneration plant (120,000 Mt/year capacity, operated as a JV with Veolia).
Decarbonization
A green/low-carbon hydrogen supply agreement was signed with Air Liquide in September 2023, targeting delivery of 10,000 t/year of green hydrogen and up to 5,000 t/year of low-carbon hydrogen from H2 2026 onward, fed from Air Liquide's 200-MW Normand'Hy PEM electrolyzer (using Siemens Energy PEM technology) — expected to cut the platform's CO₂ emissions by up to 150,000 t/year.
Petrochemical Complex
The Gonfreville platform is TotalEnergies' largest integrated petrochemical site in France. It is fed with naphtha from the adjacent refinery and produces olefins, aromatics, polymers, and elastomers across a vertically integrated chain.
Tier 1 — Steam Cracker (Olefins Unit)
The naphtha-fed steam cracker is the heart of the complex, providing ethylene and propylene to all downstream polymer and chemical units.
| Product |
Nameplate Capacity |
| Ethylene |
525,000 Mt/year |
| Propylene |
290,000 Mt/year |
| Butadiene (extraction unit) |
60,000 Mt/year |
| C4/C5 fractions, pygas |
Co-products fed to aromatics chain |
The butadiene extraction unit operates on the crude C4 stream from the cracker and restarted alongside it in mid-2025 following an extended outage.
Tier 2 — Aromatics & Styrene Chain
Benzene, sourced from both the steam cracker pyrolysis gasoline (pygas) and the refinery's catalytic reformer, feeds the ethylbenzene/styrene chain.
| Product |
Nameplate Capacity |
Technology |
| Ethylbenzene (EB) |
Not separately disclosed; co-scaled with SM unit |
Benzene + ethylene alkylation |
| Styrene Monomer (SM) |
600,000 Mt/year |
EB dehydrogenation; revamped 2009 (+210,000 Mt/year) |
The styrene unit is one of the largest in Europe and consolidated TotalEnergies' European SM production following the closure of the Carling site.
Tier 3 — Polyolefins
Tier 4 — Recycling & Circular Economy
The site hosts the Osilub used-oil regeneration plant (a JV with Veolia), with a capacity of 120,000 Mt/year of used lubricating oil re-refined into base oils — one of Europe's largest such facilities.
Overall Capacity Overview
| Stream |
Capacity (Mt/year) |
| Steam cracker ethylene |
525,000 |
| Steam cracker propylene |
290,000 |
| Butadiene extraction |
60,000 |
| Styrene monomer |
600,000 |
| HDPE |
230,000 |
| LDPE |
160,000 |
| LLDPE |
80,000 |
| Polypropylene |
230,000 |
| Polystyrene |
50,000 |
| Used-oil re-refining (Osilub) |
120,000 |
References
- Ministère de la Culture / Plateforme Ouverte du Patrimoine (POP) — Raffinerie de Normandie (last modified: Mar 21, 2025)
- Région Normandie / Inventaire du Patrimoine: Dossier d’œuvre architecture IA76002742: Usine pétrochimique ATO Chimie, puis Atochem, puis Elf Atochem, puis Ato Fina, actuellement Total Pétrochemicals (Search date: 2005; Edited: 2007)
- Normandie Énergies — Member Profile: TotalEnergies — Plateforme de Gonfreville-l'Orcher (last retrieved June 2026)
- Wikipedia — Raffinerie de Normandie (last modified: Apr 29, 2026)
- TotalEnergies — Normandy: our largest platform in France (accessed: Jun 4, 2026)
- Offshore Technology — Market Data: Gonfreville l'Orcher Refinery, France (Feb 21, 2022)
- Offshore Technology — Data Insights: Total Petrochemicals Gonfreville Complex, France (Updated: May 20, 2024)
- Petrochemicals Europe — Cracker capacity Kt ethylene/year (2021)
- Global Energy Monitor Wiki — TotalEnergies Gonfreville-l'Orcher Refinery (last edited: Nov 3, 2025)
- MarketScreener — TotalEnergies to Resume HDPE Output From Gonfreville-l'Orcher Site End of May -- OPIS (May 8, 2024)
- MarketScreener — TotalEnergies 600kt/yr Styrene Unit in Gonfreville Back Online -- OPIS (Feb 28, 2024)
- La direction de l’information légale et administrative (DILA) — Total Petrochemicals Consolidates European Styrene Business at the Gonfreville Facility and Commissions New World-Class Unit (Jan 21, 2009)
- TotalEnergies — Investor Day — Expanding Petrochemicals (Sep 21, 2018)
- Plastics Information Europe (PIE/Polyglobe) — TotalEnergies reportedly declares another force majeure for Gonfreville, France (Jan 21, 2025)
- Oil&Gas Journal — TotalEnergies inks deal for supply of green hydrogen to Normandy integrated platform (Sep 14, 2023)
- Air Liquide — Press Release: Air Liquide takes a further step in developing the hydrogen sector in France (Sep 14, 2023)
- InspectLab — TotalEnergies' Normandy integrated platform now producing SAF (May 5, 2022)
- TotalEnergies / Veolia Environnement — Veolia Environnement and Total inaugurate the Osilub recycling plant in Normandy (Nov 4, 2013)
