Ineos Nova shutting Ohio PS facility

Ineos Nova — the styrenics joint venture between Ineos Corporation and Calgary, Alta.-based Nova Chemicals — has announced that it plants to permanently shut down its Belpre, Ohio polystyrene (PS) facility by January 31, 2008.

The Belpre site has a production capacity of 220 million pounds of crystal PS per year. The joint venture also recently announced a shut down at its Montreal, Que. facility.

Shutting down the Belpre site removes additional high-cost capacity and will enable us to further consolidate production at the company’s most efficient manufacturing site,” said Ineos Nova CEO Kevin McQuade. “We expect the shut down to have minimal impact on our ability to deliver quality products to our customers and we expect to provide our customers with an effective transition during the coming months.”

According to the companies, the shut down will remove approximately 12 per cent of Ineos Nova’s North American PS production capacity.

The JV also announced that it would transfer all production of NAS and SYLAR specialty resins to its Indian Orchard, Mass. location.