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IT HAS BEEN confirmed that Bord na Móna’s briquette factory in Littleton, Co Tipperary is set to close down.
A spokesperson for the company told TheJournal.ie that a decision had been reached to retain its plant in Derrinlough, Co Offaly, but to close its Littleton facility.
The spokesperson said that both locations had only been open for six months a year for the last few years, and that they were significantly over-capacity.
The Bord na Móna group of unions, however, said that they do not accept this decision and “it will be opposed by our members by all legitimate means including industrial action”.
In all, there are 69 employees who will be affected when the Littleton facility ceases production in April 2018. Furthermore, there “will also be some impact” on the 56 employees at the peat harvesting facility in Littleton, according to Bord na Móna.
Unsustainable
Bord na Móna cites declining sales due to increased competition, low oil prices, carbon tax and other factors as contributing to the decision.
“To sustain the business into the future,” the company said in a statement, “Derrinlough factory, which employs 61 people, would be the optimum location for future investment to secure the future of the fuels business.”
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Head of Bord na Móna Fuels, Eddie Scaife, said: “This has been a very difficult decision following a period of uncertainty for employees.
Ultimately we had to make a decision that ensured we had a business that could survive these challenges and safeguard the biggest number of briquetting jobs.
“Totally unacceptable”
Unions were critical of the move, saying that a decision had been reached without engagement with unions, and that closing the Littleton facility was “premature”.
The Bord na Móna group of unions and Siptu organiser John Regan said: “Our members are very disappointed but not surprised by this move by Bord na Móna.
There have been issues with sales of peat briquettes in the last two years. However, our members believe this move is premature and unwarranted, particularly as the plant is also in a process of diversifying its output with the development of a biomass briquette.
This has angered our members and deeply disappointed them. It leaves them with no option but to consider what action must now be taken to persuade the company to reverse this unacceptable decision.
Calls for government action
In a statement this afternoon, the Green Party said the government must do more to protect the workers at the Offaly and Tipperary plants.
Leader Eamon Ryan said: “Some of the Bord na Mona workers threatened with job losses today are the third and fourth generations of their families working on bogs since the 1940s.
They have a very proud tradition but are now facing into a different future.
While the party wants fossil fuel burning to be radically reduced, it says that workers shouldn’t be left behind when these traditional industries are threatened.
Ryan calls on the government to redirect the Public Service Obligation levy of €120 million a year for the burning of peat into a fund that will re-train workers over the next few years and provide job transition supports in the affected communities.
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What is wrong with unions. They seem to live in another reality ala Trump or Brexiters. Newsflash, if your employer can only afford to stay open 6 months a year, it’s probably not doing too well and there’s probably not a market there.
Again, unions proving just how cancerous they have become. A company should keep the doors open on a plant that is economically unviable just to keep a few people in jobs and the gravy train for the union running.
What a very sad end to a factory that employed so many in a very rural area over the past few decades. Let’s hope the authorities get their act together to create alternative opportunities or review the operations to make it profitable. The huge stockpiles of briquettes in the yard were a bad sign for some time.
Is what Eammon Ryan says correct there is a €120 million subsidy already given to peat fuel…Destroying the precious bogland and increasing our carbon emissions….
@John003:
Increasing carbon emissions?
carbon tax applied by the greens (Eammon Ryan’s Party) and the peat plant closing?
How is this increasing carbon emissions?
The Green party’s legacy goes on and on and people put on the dole by their implemented policies. Heard Ryan pushing for tax on diesel cars. 95% of the worlds industry relies on diesel, Farming Shipping, heating, industrial plants, electricity supply, road transport, trains, public transport, refrigeration, yet wait and see the only sector to be hit will be private diesel cars. The farmers, not a chance.
@John003: Yes and no. The PSO levy supports two peat plants that generate electricity to the tune of €120 million. But no he is not exactly right as the peat briquettes is a different industry, although the same company. The 2 peat plants get support due to the fact it produces indigenous fuel and supports job and the cost of generating electricity from them is more expensive the system market price of electricity generation. Peat is very high in CO2 though and these plants are due to stop getting these support. The support is likely to be taken by expanding amounts of renewables. Bord Na Mona can work on this industry in the bogs.
@Alan Cooke: i agree alan the greens and goverment with carbon tax, one minister said THAT THE CARBON TAX WAS THAT JUST A TAX have made heating your home and driving your car more expensive how many got rid of good cars because they could not tax the anymore, next in line diesel cars trucks, which would include public transport! also remember it was Joan i-phone Burton who shut down the Suger Factory some years ago to help farmers in south america!
Billions could be saved if the government were to cut out waste In the many forms it takes, tribunals, consultancies, commission, reports, spin doctors and pr. companies,e voting , the HSE, Irish water setting it up then dismantling it, expenses and allowances, free legal aid for well paid people, you could go on and on and on.
They can not accept it all they want,
The industry has massively changed and the market has changed, under no circumstances should the government support a fuel business that is going to be more and more obsolete as the years go by.
Its awful they will loose their jobs but you can’t change consumer demand!
@Stephen Finn: yep, a small hop across the border and your coal and briquettes are way cheaper. No carbon tax and VAT is 5% instead of 13.5%. Costs the Irish jobs to the tune of 2000 heads a year. Well done the Green party. And as a side note although briquettes are magically classed as smokeless fuel, their emissions are above the threshold. One rule for the semi states, a different rule for everyone else.
Heard about this months ago. Two local lads Moss and Pete going on about it, saying how they were brickin it, tuff luck, dirty business. Below board, Mona’s not impressed.
So we are still “harvesting” our peatlands and burning the bog to fill the air with carbon dioxide. I really thought we were moving on from that.
I do appreciate that there will be pain and suffering to workers who will loose their jobs and hopefully something can be done for them, but it should be expected that peat production will be wound down in the coming years and this should be a wake up call that fossil fuel based industries need to plan to diversify
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