by Angus Young
A long-standing company based at Saltend Chemicals Park has mothballed its factory there.
Norwegian chemical firm Yara first opened an ammonia manufacturing plant at the site in 1989. Since then, ammonia produced at the facility has been regularly shipped to customers around Europe.
In recent years it has been operated on Yara’s behalf by Ineos, the chemicals giant led by Sir James Ratcliffe, who recently took over sporting operations at Manchester United.
However, the plant is now being mothballed ahead of Saltend’s anticipated switch away from relying on natural gas as a power feed for the site to hydrogen, which is currently more expensive.
A gradual shutdown is understood to have started last month.
A Yara spokeswoman said: “Yara’s ammonia plant has been mothballed.
“This planned transition follows the supplier’s decision to terminate the feedstock deliveries.
“We are continuously optimising our portfolio, and the plant may be restarted in the future if Yara can secure access to competitive feedstock from other sources.”
The closure is part of a plan by Yara to reduce the amount of ammonia it produces in Europe by about a million metric tonnes over the next few years, relying instead on cheaper imports from outside Europe for its own fertiliser business.
The Saltend plant produced about 300,000 metric tonnes of ammonia per year.
Ammonia production at another Yara facility in Belgium is also being shut down.