Hanson reopen Teesport slag grinding plant

Reopening of mothballed ground granulated blast-furnace slag grinding plant creates 20 new jobs

HANSON have reopened their ground granulated blast-furnace slag grinding plant at Teesport Docks in Middlesbrough, creating 20 new jobs.

The plant was mothballed in 2009 during the recession, but a continuing upturn in construction activity prompted Hanson to return to the site last year and prepare it for reopening.

The Teesport plant takes blast-furnace slag – a by-product of the steel industry – and grinds it into a fine powder for use as a cement substitute in ready-mixed concrete.

The raw material was originally sourced from the nearby steel works, which has now closed. In future it will be imported, helping to sustain the docks.

Site manager Duncan Felgate said: ‘It has taken nine months to get up and running again. One of the main problems we had to overcome was to replace all the copper wiring, which had been meticulously stripped out by thieves.’

The £2 million project to reopen the site was completed on time and on budget, and the new staff have all been put through a comprehensive technical and operational training programme. 

Some of them have returned to Hanson having been at the works before it was mothballed, but the majority are new starters.

Hanson sell their ground granulated blast-furnace slag under the Regen brand name and operate a further two UK production plants at Purfleet, in Essex, and Port Talbot, in South Wales.

Regen is currently in high demand as a sustainable alternative to cement in ready-mixed and precast concrete.

Replacing one tonne of cement in concrete with Regen reduces the embodied CO2 by around 900kg, and also increases its durability. It is added at the mixing plant and can replace as much as 90% of the cement content.