Tronox to idle TiO2 plant

Following a strategic review and consultation with the works council, Tronox has told the 240-strong workforce that it will idle its 90,000 tonnes/year TiO2 plant in Botlek, Netherlands. The site had been shut down since 6 March, because of an outage by its chlorine supplier.

CEO John D. Romano said that the review was prompted by “the ongoing global supply imbalance caused by Chinese competition as well as an increasingly challenged operating environment over the last two and a half years”. Idling Botlek, he added, “enables the optimisation of our remaining facilities and improves our overall manufacturing costs”.

Tronox, which is the one of the world’s largest producers of the white pigment, anticipates incurring around $130-160 million in restructuring and other related charges over the next 18 months, including $55-65 million of non-cash write-downs related to the idling of the facility. Cost savings of over $30 million/year are expected from 2026 onwards.