Petrolina and the Lefkaritis family: Larnaca’s fuel-storage chapter

A family business before the petroleum company

According to Petrolina’s published history, five Lefkaritis brothers — Nikos, Takis, Kallis, Kikis and Nakis — established a general partnership in 1946. Land transport and vehicle trading were its early activities. The company remembers the group’s green buses as part of its island-wide transport operations.

That beginning matters because the family enterprise predates Petrolina itself. A history of the group and a history of its petroleum business do not start with the same event. The transport background helps explain the range of activities recorded in the later corporate story without making every business a petrol company from the outset.

The petroleum business takes shape

The narrative places the founding of Petrolina Ltd in 1959 and its official inauguration in 1960. The milestone list groups its establishment, Larnaca storage facilities, early filling stations and liquefied petroleum gas facilities under 1960. These are best read as a formation and inauguration sequence, rather than competing dates for an unchanged organisation.

Fuel tanks and distribution facilities became a physical part of Larnaca’s commercial landscape. Unlike a castle or a church, a depot was built to receive, store and move a commodity. Its historical significance lies partly in that everyday work and in the land it occupied.

Growth through networks and acquisitions

The company groups expansion of filling stations, additional tanks and an Agip lubricant agreement in its 1970s milestones. Its 1980s account records the acquisition of Fina (Cyprus), renamed Lina. In the following decade, the Shell Cyprus acquisition and changes to the Petrolina holding company brought further consolidation.

These decade headings should not be mistaken for exact transaction dates. They document the broad sequence supplied by the business. Petrolina’s listing on the Cyprus Stock Exchange in 2000 provides a separate, explicitly dated milestone in the transition from family origins to a listed corporate structure.

Vassiliko and the changing coastline

Petrolina states that its Vassiliko liquid-fuel terminal became fully operational on 1 January 2020. It describes eighteen tanks with a combined capacity of 113,000 cubic metres. The terminal belongs to a different location from the older installations on the Larnaca–Dhekelia road.

Its later milestones include demolition of coastal fuel tanks and the creation of Petrolina Bayfront, a property business. Read these as evidence of a shift in land use. They do not establish that every former industrial plot is now a completed public attraction or that a particular redevelopment is open to visitors.

Reading an industrial landscape

For a visitor interested in modern Larnaca, this account complements the seafront and old-town histories: the city was also a place of transport, storage and distribution. The relocation of industry is part of its recent history, alongside the older religious and archaeological sites.

Use the linked company account for locations and further historical material. Fuel installations are working infrastructure; this article does not propose entering them. No factory tour, public access or precise viewing point is implied. The chronology here follows the company’s own retrospective and leaves out promotional claims about leadership, quality and environmental performance.

Source and further reading

• Company-published history (primary account)

Source reviewed 15 October 2026. Company history is presented as the company’s own account.

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