W

hen Salt Lake City, Utah-based Huntsman Corp. decided to build the world's largest low-density polyethylene (LDPE) plant, the infrastructure the company had already established at its Wilton site in Greater, Teesside, U.K., removed much of the site selection suspense.
      "The company's European ethylene production is located at Wilton on Teesside and provides a ready source of raw material for the new LDPE facility," explains Bill Perfitt, Huntsman UK's director of public affairs. "Teesside has a long heritage of successful chemical production. There is a skilled local work force and an experienced support contractor base. The area has excellent road, rail and port facilities for distribution within the U.K. and our target markets in continental Europe."
      That made the answer easy for the company's US$377-million, 117-job investment on a 30-acre (12-hectare) site adjacent to the existing operations in the northeast region of the United Kingdom. Nearly 50 percent of the output of the ethylene cracker already on site will be funneled to the new facility. And while the existing infrastructure will serve the company well, approximately 20 percent of the total investment will go toward logistics-related development.
      "The LDPE plant will produce 400,000 [metric tons] of LDPE per annum," says Perfitt, with most of that product destined for packaging applications. "This will be transported from the site in trucks either directly to customers or for onward transportation by sea or rail. We will be constructing a site-based logistics platform to store and handle the plant's output and provide loading facilities."
      U.K. business, representing a 500,000-metric-ton annual market, stands to benefit from the project. But total European demand stands at approximately 5 million metric tons. Thus this plant when up and running in late 2007 will quickly take the country from net importer to net exporter status.
      Perfitt is quick to point out the $31 million in assistance the company received from the U.K.'s Regional Selective Assistance scheme. "This welcome support from the Government — and the recognition it demonstrated of the significant importance the government attaches to the U.K. chemical industry — was very important to Huntsman as part of its decision-making process to go ahead with this project," he says.