The Saltend bioethanol plant under construction in 2010. Photo Andy Beecroft / geograph.org.uk (CC BY-SA 2.0).
The government’s trade deal with the US has led to the closure of Vivergo Fuels bioethanol plant in Saltend, Humberside.
The deal scrapped tariffs on a quota of 1.4 billion litres of bioethanol from the US, the exact size of British production. This will allow US ethanol to flood the British market.
The Vivergo plant is owned by Associated British Foods (ABF) and was Britain’s largest producer of bioethanol fuel – a fuel derived from plants and considered to be a green alternative to fossil fuels.
Vivergo bought up to 1 million tonnes of wheat each year from British farmers. The last wheat delivery to the plant was on 1 August. Redundancy of its 160 employees began on 19 August.
Over 4,000 British farmers supplied the plant and will now have to find alternative buyers for their wheat, facing weaker prices due to the drop in demand. The closure is also a blow to Britain’s logistics industry.
• A longer version of this article is on the web at www.cpbml.org.uk