The owners of a historic refinery in south central Kentucky say they are shutting down operations.



Ed Phelps, a spokesman for Somerset Energy Refining, the company that owns the refinery, says they weren't able to buy enough crude oil to keep the business open.

The Commonwealth Journal of Somerset reports that the refinery at its peak in November employed 66 people.

Phelps says the company's largest supplier of crude stopped selling to the company last month, and instead began shipping its products to Marathon Oil.

The Somerset Refinery had been turning crude oil into gasoline for generations before it ran into financial trouble and shut down in late 2006.

In 2008 Michael Grunberg bought the ailing refinery for $2.2 million and spent another $20 million modernizing the plant.

Information from: Commonwealth Journal, http://www.somerset-kentucky.com

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