The three plants are Europe’s last remaining world-scale Acetyls units, producing a raw material used across a wide range of the continent’s critical industries, including pharmaceuticals, clothing, cosmetics, detergents, construction materials and military explosives.
The plants support close to 4,000 highly skilled jobs, along with associated apprenticeship schemes, and their products are sold throughout Europe. Two of the plants have already ceased production, with the third due to come offline within days.
According to Ineos, the gas price in Europe is now 12x higher than in the US, and the plants rely on gas both for energy and as a feedstock in the production process. European gas is also said to be eight times more expensive than gas-based production in China, which uses coal.
The company said the impact on CO2 emissions is similarly stark, with US-made product carrying a carbon footprint twice the European level, and Chinese-made material eight times higher.
Ineos’s Hull site operates three world-scale chemical intermediate plants that produce building blocks for industries across Europe, including pharmaceuticals, food products, clothing, cosmetics, detergents, construction materials and high-energy military explosives. The plants are the last remaining Acetyls units in Europe, with all others having already closed due to uncompetitive energy costs.
Commenting, Jim Ratcliffe, Chairman of Ineos, said, “I’m sure people will find it hard to believe that we are being forced to mothball some of the most efficient plants in Europe but with gas prices now 12 times the level in the US and 8 times that of China, we just cannot compete.
“Not only is the ridiculously high gas price destroying our manufacturing base and the jobs of hard-working people on Humberside, it is also massively increasing the environmental burden with replacement products supplied from the USA at double the carbon emissions and from China at 8 times the emission level.
“The European regulators need to wake up to the fact that the combination of high energy costs and the additional burden of unsustainable carbon taxes are destroying our European manufacturing base. Ironically, this will result in higher CO2 emissions from less efficient Chinese and US production. The net result of these current policies is to encourage coal-based production in China and the wholesale export of jobs to both China and the USA.”
Source: chemanager-online.com
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