A FORMER vice-president of BP has been appointed as chairman of Biofuels Corporation, on Teesside.

Mike Buzzacott, who spent 35 years at British Petroleum, was voted in as chairman at a board meeting yesterday, replacing Field Walton, who announced his intention to step down last summer.

Following a series of delays, Biofuels started production at its newly-built plant - the largest in the UK - at Seal Sands, near Billingham, at the end of last month.

Mr Buzzacott is an accountant who held a range of senior management positions at BP in Europe and Asia in the finance, downstream, nutrition and chemicals sectors.

He retired from BP in 2004 as group vice-president of the petrochemicals division and is non-executive director at Croda International and Rexam, and also an advisor to the Ineos Chemicals group, a privately-owned company.

He said yesterday: "I am delighted to be joining Biofuels at this exciting stage in its development. The demand for all biofuels is set to grow dramatically and the company is well-placed to become the UK's premier producer of biodiesel in the near to medium term."

Yesterday, Biofuels said it was producing market-quality biodiesel and was focused on increasing production to capacity - although it declined to give a target date.

A statement said: "The comments made by the Chancellor last week, in his Budget speech, re-affirming the Government's commitment to the reduction of carbon emissions were very encouraging for the industry."