Ineos ChlorVinyls plans to close its 149,000 mt/year mercury chlorine cell room at Wilhelmshaven, Germany during the second quarter of 2013, a company source said Tuesday.
The previously announced move to reconfigure its 300,000mt/yr vinyl chloride monomer unit to produce ethylene dichloride at Runcorn in the UK will also take place during the second quarter. The closure of Ineos ChlorVinyls' 105,000 mt/year PVC plant at Runcorn is understood to be taking place by the end of February. Precise dates for the cell room closure and the work at Runcorn have not yet been decided.
Ineos' sales position on both chlorine and caustic soda would not be dramatically affected by the Wilhelmshaven shutdown, the source said, adding that the aim was to eliminate the fixed costs associated with this less efficient site and maximize production at other locations. "If you can take out fixed costs and get the same output, it makes sense," the source said.
Customers of the Wilhelmshaven site would simply be supplied from elsewhere, the source added, saying, "there will not be too much of an impact" but confirming that logistical changes would need to be made.
The company is and would remain a net buyer of ethylene dichloride despite the changes to its capacity, the source said.
EDC is imported from various locations to its PVC production facilities at Wilhelmshaven. After the work at Runcorn, there will be a regular movement between the UK and Germany.
Ineos ChlorVinyls announced the rationalization in January after an internal asset review found it needed to address overcapacity in chlorine, vinyl chloride monomer and PVC. The review was established to asses the impact of the prolonged economic downturn in European demand which had been particularly pronounced for PVC.
