The APUK PET plant at Wilton International produces PET resin, which is used to make food grade plastic bottles and containers. The facility was originally owned and operated by ICI, sourcing PTA & MEG, its main feedstocks, from the same site. Now, progressively replacing these feedstocks with recycled PET is central to the company’s sustainability strategy. Benefiting from Wilton International’s connectivity and logistics infrastructure As a recent inward investor to Wilton International, Alpek saw the site’s logistics infrastructure and freight connectivity as key benefits.

From chemicals and plastics to steel and electronics, industry has a wide range of essential uses for nitrogen, as Carl Shuttleworth explains: “Businesses in the chemical and process sectors need large-scale nitrogen supplies because it’s an inert gas. It doesn’t react with other agents and it prevents the oxidation of materials, which is very useful,” Carl says. “Nitrogen is widely used to prevent fires and explosions in dangerous environments, by lowering the oxygen level below explosive limits.

Wilton International, a 2,000-acre industrial site in Teesside, UK, is home to a well-established cluster of energy-intensive businesses, each benefiting from a unique combination of infrastructure, utilities and services. And with 562 acres of development land currently available, the site is drawing significant interest from prospective new occupants with similar requirements. “At present, we have development plots available in sizes from 2.5 up to 66 acres”, says Matthew Scrimshaw, Commercial Director at Sembcorp Energy UK, the company that manages the site and owns much of the land.

Vulnerable supply chains That’s because the pandemic subjected the UK’s critical supply chains to stress tests that, in many cases, revealed weaknesses. Demand for medical and personal protective equipment (PPE) exceeded supply, exposing the country’s reliance on imports. In the words of the GTMA manufacturers’ trade body: “Amongst the many things we have learnt during the COVID-19 pandemic there is a wider recognition that cheapest purchase price has generated a vulnerability of supply chains with geographic disruption and reduced capacity to uplift production in the UK.