Rohm and Haas to close Mississippi plant

Rohm and Haas Company today announced that it will discontinue all manufacturing of both its Adhesive and Sealants products and Organic Specialties products at its Moss Point chemicals facility by year-end. This decision follows an earlier announcement that the company would exit the Liquid Polysulfide and Insulated Glass Businesses and shut down those production facilities as well. Today's announcement will result in the elimination of all 210 positions at the chemicals facility.

"This is a very disappointing day at the plant," said Jane Bowen, manager of the Moss Point chemicals facility. "The employees have worked hard at this facility to improve productivity, safety and environmental performance. "Unfortunately, the business environment we find ourselves in today, together with the capital investment many of the product lines at the plant required in order to meet acceptable manufacturing standards, made the continued operation of this facility unrealistic."

In today's announcement, employees at the site were informed that the adhesives product lines at the plant would be transferred to other Rohm and Haas manufacturing in North America, where there is excess capacity, or manufactured at third-party manufacturers in order to be cost effective. The Organic Specialties products, primarily known as 2-mercaptoethanol (2ME) and their related derviatives and products will no longer be made by the company once production ends by year-end at Moss Point.

"Exiting our 2ME business was not an easy decision, but necessary given the present business environment, the capital investment required over the next few years and the added challenge of sourcing one of our major raw materials from an outside supplier once the LP process shut down at Moss Point," Carol Eicher, Business Unit Director of Organic Specialties for Rohm and Haas Company told the employees at the facility.

The Adhesives and Sealants Business will relocate the manufacturing of polyurethanes to another Rohm and Haas facility in its North American network where additional capacity already exists. The businesses plasticizers and energy curable product lines will be relocated to third-party manufacturers in order to continue to provide those customers with the product in a cost effective manner.

The timing of each of the production units shut-down is not known at this time. All production facilities are expected to be down by the end of 2001, although some may closer earlier depending on customer demand and other operating issues.

The Moss Point facility was opened in 1952 and became part of the Rohm and Haas Company with the acquisition of Morton Chemicals, in 1999. The Moss Point site also includes the Shipley, Moss Point facility, the company's electronic materials subsidiary.

Source: Rohm and Haas

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