Latest news with #Norbord
BBC News
2 days ago
- Business
- BBC News
'Cloud factory' timber plant near Inverness to get own rail yard
Plans for a new rail yard next to an industrial site on the outskirts of Inverness have been approved by Highland aim of the development is to reduce the number of HGVs travelling on the roads to deliver timber to the Norbord plant, known locally as the "cloud factory" because of steam that rises from a large West Fraser Europe Ltd plan to build new rail sidings, about 560m (1,837ft) in length, that would be connected to the Inverness to Aberdeen first trains are expected to arrive at the site by next year but the full expansion would not be completed until 2028. West Fraser Europe Ltd said the plan would help give the wood panel manufacturing plant a sustainable future. It is anticipated about 20,000 HGV movements would be removed from the road network in favour of transportation by emission reductions are predicted to be in the region of 9,000 by local democracy reporter Will Angus.
BBC News
17-02-2025
- BBC News
Firm fined £1.14m over Cowie factory safety failings
The operators of a Scottish chipboard factory have been fined £1,148,000 after safety failings caused serious injuries to two different workers within six (Europe) Ltd, formerly known as Norbord, admitted multiple breaches of health and safety at its plant in Cowie village near worker suffered serious injuries after his leg was caught in moving parts in a storage bunker, while another fell more than 13ft (3.96m) after a rusty plate gave way on a rooftop was fined £2,125,000 in 2022 for an incident at the plant in which an employee suffered fatal burns. The factory, a major employer in the local area, opened in 1970 and was originally known as Sheriff Court heard that in January 2020, utility operator Sean Gallagher entered the bunker, which stored biomass for the plant's boilers, in order to clear a clogged auger - a tool used for boring turning off the power to the auger and isolating the system, he got into the bunker through an inspection hatch that had no protective guard fitted, and his right leg became entangled in the was taken to Forth Valley Royal Infirmary with compound fractures to both the tibia and fibula in his right leg and multiple court heard that Mr Gallagher has not returned to work since the court also heard the company had since fitted a secondary guard to the hatch, secured by a padlock, with the key kept secure in the supervisor's office, and only issued in the event of the entire system being isolated and locked second incident took place in July that David McMillan, an employee of Chester-based Palmers Scaffolding UK, was providing holiday cover at the site he was instructed to help erect scaffolding using a permanent gantry on the roof accessed by a fixed completed his task on the roof, he set out to descend, but as he jumped down onto the gantry a rusty floor plate gave way, falling to the ground and taking Mr McMillan with court heard it was "immediately obvious" to his colleagues that he was seriously injured, and the emergency services were was taken to the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow with ankle fractures, a shattered left heel, a broken elbow and ribs, multiple fractures to vertebrae in his neck, a collapsed lung and a broken concluded the "likely cause" of the walkway floor collapsing was corrosion of a floor plate at its supporting edge. 'Risk of death' The court heard that immediately after the accident, the gantry was placed out of bounds, dismantled, and Keith O'Mahony said that in the case of the auger incident, the victim, for reasons unknown, had departed from safety procedures the company had operated successfully for said: "What I have to assess is not what the injured party did, but rather what he was able to do as a result of the health and safety deficiency."In the case of Mr McMillan, Sheriff O'Mahony said there was "evidence of confusion" between departments as to who had responsibility for maintenance of the said: "The injuries sustained were severe, and there was plainly a risk of death. There were a number of other workers engaged in the same project and therefore exposed to the same risk."The risk itself had never been identified, there is no evidence it was going to be, and therefore no evidence remedial work would have been undertaken."The plant was the first factory in the UK to manufacture the natural wood substitute is now in Canadian ownership and operates two sites in the UK, at Cowie and Inverness, with the Cowie site employing 320 people.
