Our history
bp’s history
bp’s history
Starting in 1908 with the discovery of oil in Persia (now Iran), our story has always been about transitions – from oil to gas, from onshore to deep water, and now towards a mix of energy sources as the world moves into a lower carbon future.
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1901
Beginning of our story
On 28 May 1901, William Knox D’Arcy was granted a 60-year concession to explore and market oil, gas, asphalt and ozokerite across vast stretches of Persia.
D’Arcy formed the First Exploitation Company on 31 May 1903, with a capital of
£60,000
1904
Running out of money
With D’Arcy’s finances stretched and no oil, all operations at Chiah Surkh were suspended on 23 June. But by November, a new deal, the Concessions Syndicate, backed by Burmah Oil, was in place.
A new search for oil in 1905 took Reynolds to Shardin, 100 miles northeast of Basra. By 1907, drilling at Shardin looked pointless, so Reynolds headed to Masjid-i-Suleiman, 125 miles northeast of Abadan.
1908
Dawn of discovery
Burmah Oil provided another £40,000 of funding and the drilling of two wells began at Masjid-i-Suleiman.
An early drilling well, c.1910
On the fateful day of 26 May 1908, the air hung heavy with the pungent smell of sulphur. At 4am, the drill plunged to a depth of 1,180 feet. And then, a fountain of oil erupted into the dawn sky.
1908
William Knox D’Arcy
William Knox D’Arcy was born in Devon, England, and then practised as a solicitor in Australia, where he invested in a gold mine. In 1889, he returned to England with a fortune.
On 14 April 1909, the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, Limited was incorporated with an authorized capital of
£2 million
listed and traded on the London Stock Exchange.
1912
Our first refinery
On its completion in 1912, Abadan refinery in Persia became the world’s largest.
1914
Admiralty deal
Nearly bankrupt, Anglo-Persian signed a deal to supply the Royal Navy with 40m barrels of oil over 20 years in return for £2m and the British government taking a 51% stake in the company.
1915
British Tanker Company
British Tanker Company was established as the shipping business of Anglo-Persian.
Launch of the British Aviator, c.1924
1916
First research centre
In 1916, Anglo-Persian purchased a Georgian mansion in Sunbury-on-Thames, England, as a centre of research focused on oil refining.
Sunbury laboratory, c.1920s
1917
The birth of a brand
The British Petroleum brand was originally created by a German firm as a way of marketing its products in Britain. During WWI, the British government seized that company’s assets, and the Public Trustee sold them to Anglo-Persian.
Two-gallon BP Motor Spirit can, c.1920s
1920
Fuelling the Commonwealth
The Oil Agreement Act, 1920 enabled the Anglo-Persian Oil Company and His Majesty’s Government of Australia to form the Commonwealth Oil Refineries Limited, which developed an oil refining industry in Australia.
Commonwealth Oil Refineries
1921
Shaping the UK’s energy landscape
Llandarcy refinery in Wales began operation in 1921. It holds a significant place in history as the UK’s first oil refinery.
It was followed in 1924 by Grangemouth, in Scotland, also playing a crucial role in Scotland’s oil industry.
View of Grangemouth refinery frontage
1925
Turkish Petroleum Company
A concession covering most of Iraq was granted to the Turkish Petroleum Company, in which Anglo-Persian held a 47.5% interest. In 1927, oil was discovered near the city of Kirkuk.
Group of drillers and staff, Baba Gurgur Well No.1, Iraq, c.1920s
1932
When bp met Shell
As the Great Depression made its impact on the UK, and with prices falling, Anglo-Persian and Royal Dutch-Shell agreed to combine their UK marketing operations, to be known as Shell-Mex and B.P. Ltd. This arrangement lasted until 1976.
A delivery truck displaying BP Ethyl posters, c.1930s
Two pipelines, running
1,152 miles
from Kirkuk, Iraq, to Haifa, Palestine, via Lebanon, were built by Iraq Petroleum Company, part-owned by Anglo-Persian.
1935
It’s all in the name
The Anglo-Persian Oil Company changed its name to Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. This was a result of the country of Persia changing its name to Iran.
1944
Operation PLUTO
The covert pipeline that turned the English Channel into a liquid highway during the WWII D-Day landings in Normandy in 1944.
1950
From rationing to refining
WWII made gasoline a rationed commodity in the UK. When petrol rationing ended in 1950, Llandarcy refinery in Wales was expanded.
1951
End of an era
Nationalists throughout the Middle East angrily questioned Western companies’ right to profit from Middle Eastern resources. Iran’s prime minister spoke vehemently against Anglo-Iranian’s presence in Iran.
In 1951, the Iranian Parliament decided to nationalize oil operations within the country’s borders.
1951
Evacuation
At the end of April 1951, Iran’s oil industry was nationalized.
In June, Anglo-Iranian began evacuating expatriate staff and families from the country and by 5 October, everyone had left.
Company staff gathering at the Gymkhana Club, Abadan, before boarding HMS Mauritius, October 1951
1954
New Iranian agreement
With no income, Iran accepted a new partnership proposal, including a 25-year contract to manage the country’s oilfields and refineries and a 50-50 profit split between it and a new consortium called Iranian Oil Participants.
This consortium of companies, including Standard Oil of Indiana (Amoco), and others, was created to run the oil operations in Iran, of which Anglo-Iranian had a 40% share.
1954
A changing name
With the ending of the unwritten agreement between the former Shah of Persia and William D’Arcy, in December 1954, the board changed the company’s name to the British Petroleum Company.
Fixing the company’s new name plate on its headquarters at Britannic House in London, December 1954
1955
Ads the way to do it
bp, like others, saw the potential of the new medium of television and its first commercial hit the small screens in the UK.
1964
First offshore North Sea licence
In September, bp was granted its first UK North Sea licence and began exploration immediately.
After searching for almost half a century for a major source of home-grown British hydrocarbons, bp found success in the winter of 1965 with discovery of the West Sole gas field. Sea Gem became the company’s first offshore drilling rig in the North Sea.
1965
Sea Gem
Tragically, just over six months after it spudded the first well in the winter of 1965 and only weeks after confirming the historic discovery, the Sea Gem became the North Sea’s first major rig disaster.
On 27 December 1965, during a moving operation to its second well site, the Sea Gem capsized and sank. Sadly, 14 of the 32 men onboard lost their lives.
Many engineering and safety lessons were learned from the Sea Gem tragedy, which led to critical changes in the UK oil and gas industry.
1969
Alaskan adventures
A bigger find awaited in Alaska, but after a decade of drilling dry wells, bp was on the verge of abandoning its search.
1970
Forties field unleashed
bp made its largest discovery to date in the UK North Sea, the giant Forties field, a multi-billion-barrel oilfield, 160 kilometres from the nearest shore.
1971
Nationalization
Colonel Ghaddafi, Libya’s leader since 1969, nationalized bp’s share of its joint venture. By 1972, other Middle Eastern countries had forced the international oil companies to hand over 25% of their concessions, rising to 51% over 10 years.
One by one after that, almost every oil-rich nation in the region – Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, Qatar – announced that if they weren’t nationalizing their resources immediately, they would within the next 10 years.
1974
Falling production
Oil-producing countries in the Middle East continued to raise their interests in the oil companies’ operations – bp’s production of crude oil would go from 80% of bp’s supply down to a meagre 10%.
In 1977, bp was part of a consortium that built the 1,200km Trans-Alaska Pipeline System. By 1979, it transported
1.2m
barrels of crude oil per day.
1978
A Standard merger
bp’s initial 25% stake in Standard Oil of Ohio (Sohio) ensured that Sohio facilities were ready to bring bp’s first Alaskan gasoline to market.
In June 1987, bp bought the remaining 45% of Sohio and merged it with its other US interests, re-naming it BP America Inc.
The Forties field had been brought into production by 1975, and by 1978, it was supplying the equivalent of
20%
of the UK’s oil requirements.
1987
bp and a share sale gamble
The British government sold its remaining stake in bp, making the company fully privatized in October 1987.
1997
Browne’s bold move
On 19 May 1997, bp chief executive Lord Browne’s speech at Stanford University, in the US, hit the headlines, and bp published a statement on climate change.
1998
Fuelling the future
bp and US oil firm Amoco merged in the then-largest industrial merger. This was followed by the acquisition of ARCO and Burmah Castrol, creating a global ‘supermajor’.
2000
Redefining a logo
Following the major tie-ups with Amoco, ARCO, Burmah Castrol, and others, in July 2000, BP Amoco announced it would now call itself BP plc and revealed the new ‘Helios’ symbol, a green and yellow sunflower logo named after the Greek sun god.
A bp service station featuring the new Helios logo in Illinois. US
2002
Aral
Veba Oel was acquired by bp, bringing access to several German refineries and Aral, Germany’s largest retail fuel brand. bp’s 630 retail stations in Germany were rebranded with the Aral blue and white.
Aral service station
2003
TNK-BP
bp became a major player in the Russian oil industry through the formation of TNK-BP, a 50:50 joint venture with Russian investors AAR.
2005
Texas City incident
On 23 March 2005, 15 workers were killed and more than 170 injured in an explosion at the Texas City refinery.
In October, the US Refineries Independent Safety Review Panel was formed, and bp committed to implement the panel’s 10 recommendations.
2007
Rotterdam
bp sold its last refinery in the UK, Coryton in Essex, in 2007.
However, it also acquired full ownership of the Rotterdam refinery in the Netherlands, which remains its largest refinery in Europe.
bp had previously sold a large part of its petrochemicals business, including the Lavéra and Grangemouth refineries, to Ineos, in 2005.
Catalytic cracking complex at Rotterdam refinery
2010
Deepwater Horizon
On 20 April 2010, an explosion and subsequent fire led to the tragic loss of 11 lives and the sinking of the Transocean Deepwater Horizon drilling rig.
The rig had been completing operations on the Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico, 130 miles southeast of New Orleans.
Oil flowed from the well for 87 days before it was permanently sealed (see bp’s response and find out more about our commitment to the Gulf of Mexico).
2012
London 2012
bp was a major tier 1 sponsor and key partner of the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games held in its home city, London.
bp sponsors the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games
2012
Rosneft
bp sold to Rosneft its 50% stake in TNK-BP for $12.48 billion in cash and 18.5% Rosneft shares. Following the deal, this gave bp a total 19.75% interest in Rosneft, Russia’s largest oil company.
In 2022, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, bp announced its exit from Russia, including that it would exit its shareholding in Rosneft.
2017
From fossils to future
bp and solar power developer Lightsource agreed to form a strategic partnership and the company was renamed Lightsource bp. In 2023, bp agreed to acquire the remaining stake and become the sole owner.
Lightsource bp launches Bighorn Solar project in Colorado – powering the world’s first steel mill to run almost entirely on solar
2018
Energizing acquisitions
bp purchased US oil and gas assets from BHP Billiton – upgrading its American onshore business. The $10.5 billion acquisition was bp’s biggest since buying ARCO in 2000. After completion, bp renamed its US onshore oil and gas business BPX Energy.
bpx’s Grand Slam facility in the Permian Basin, near Orla, Texas
2018
Charging the future
bp bought the UK’s largest EV charging company, Chargemaster. This and further investments in EV charging in the UK and across other key markets, have since been rebranded bp pulse.
A bp pulse charging station in Guangzhou, China
2019
Sustainable fuelling
A major expansion in renewable energy was announced, combining bp’s interests in Brazilian biofuels with those of Bunge to create a world-class bioenergy company, bp Bunge Bioenergia.
In 2024, bp reached an agreement to become the sole owner.
bp Bunge Bioenergia biofuels business in Brazil
2020
Beyond boundaries
bp revealed a new strategy to pivot from International Oil Company producing resources, to an Integrated Energy Company focused on delivering solutions for customers.
Find out more about our transformation.
