Biomass plant at Kronospan to secure 600 jobs

Plans for building a new biomass plant at a chipboard factory in Chirk have been approved by councillors on the planning committee of Wrexham County Borough Council, securing 600 jobs as part of the project, a recent news report in the local business media has revealed.

The new installation will generate 32MW of heat for the Kronospan plant in Chirk, with superheated steam then extracted to provide heat to the MDF manufacturing plant to use in board production.

The biomass facility would be powered by recycled wood fibre rejected from the manufacturing process, bark stripped from logs, and dust and fibre not used in the manufacturing process. In fact, it is expected to use close to 62,000 tonnes of wood residues a year, that would otherwise have to be exported off the site.

A statement supporting the application said: “The development of a biomass plant and screening facility would help secure the jobs of 600 staff currently employed at the site and contribute to maintaining the jobs of the 2,500 people indirectly employed by the operations.

“The majority of the staff at the biomass plant would be skilled operatives or technical engineers. It would be staffed by existing employees on the site.”