Aug 25 2006
Huntsman Corporation has announced that it is to cease production of Heavy Duty Liquids (HDL) at its Whitehaven Site around end of September 2006.
The long term future of the Whitehaven Site has been in serious doubt in recent times due to deteriorating market conditions which have severely impacted the viability of the business over a period of many years.
Unfortunately, despite Huntsman’s best endeavours to make a success of the HDL operation, a very serious setback was suffered earlier this year when a key customer decided to discontinue taking product from the Company in the UK.
This deeply disappointing development has dealt a very serious blow to the survival chances of the business at Whitehaven. Despite efforts to offset the impact of the customer decision, Site management have reluctantly come to the conclusion that - following a thorough review - the only realistic option available is to cease HDL production at Whitehaven.
Given this set of circumstances, the Company has decided it is important now to concentrate its efforts into supporting the nine remaining site employees, and will now enter into consultation with each individual. Everything possible will be done to help find alternative employment for the employees affected, either within other parts of Huntsman or outside the company.
It is planned that following the cessation of production, the early part of October will be used for cleaning, decommissioning and isolation of equipment with the rest of the month used to allow the transfer of production and stock consumption. It is expected that most of the remaining employees will leave around the end of October.
Huntsman would like to place on record its sincere appreciation to its employees at Whitehaven for their continued commitment and contribution to producing high quality products safely during a period of major restructuring over the last three years.
Arrangements will be put in place to continue to meet customers’ needs from other parts of Huntsman’s European surfactants manufacturing operations.
http://www.huntsman.com/