TATA Chemicals Europe (TCE) is planning to shut down its ‘loss-making’ plant in Lostock by the end of January next year.
High energy prices in Europe, an oversupplied market and the need to reduce carbon emissions have pushed the chemical manufacturer to look at ceasing operations at the soda ash plant on Works Lane.
This decision will impact around 70 members of staff, with many being redeployed to other areas of the company.
It comes as TCE announces plans for a new £60 million 180kt/year sodium bicarbonate production plant in Winnington - what the firm describes as its biggest investment in 50 years.
A spokesperson said: “As part of enabling the new investment, the decision to propose the cessation of production at the Lostock plant has been a hugely difficult one which we have not taken lightly, but fundamentally we believe these changes are essential to secure the future of our Northwich operations.”
The new £60 million plant, anticipated to become operational in 2027, will help TCE in moving away from commodity chemical production and towards specialty, high grade products.
It will treble the firm’s high-grade capacity and produce ‘Ecokarb’ – a high purity, medical grade product made with CO2 captured from its energy plant for use in the pharmaceutical industry.
TCE say this will ‘cement Northwich as the home of world-leading innovation and sustainable manufacturing’, securing highly skilled and highly paid jobs.
It follows the opening of the UK’s first industrial scale Carbon Capture and Utilisation plant in 2022 and the upcoming opening of a £30 million Pharmaceutical Salt plant in Middlewich, another UK-first, later this year.
The TCE spokesperson added: “The announcement of our proposed plans is part of a long-held strategy to increase our focus on differentiated high-end products where we already have a well-established and strong reputation and experience base.
“To this end, our £60 million sodium bicarbonate plant will treble the amount of medical grade sodium bicarbonate we can produce and complement our soon-to-be-completed £30 million investment in a new 70,000-tonne medical-grade salt plant at our Middlewich site.”
To enable this development, TCE will ‘restructure’ its UK operations.
This includes proposals to cease operation at the ‘loss-making’ Lostock plant.
The product manufactured at the plant will be replaced by natural soda ash from TATA Chemicals in the USA, which has lower energy intensity and plans to reduce and remove carbon emissions in the coming years.
Around 70 roles will be affected by the proposed changes, with a ‘significant number of employees’ being redeployed to TCE’s other manufacturing plants, including the new sodium bicarbonate site.
As part of the proposals, a consultation process will take place with impacted employees and trade union representatives.
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