Fire hits Yorkshire chemicals plant
24 May 2010
Huddersfield, UK – Firefighters from West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service have battled though the night to bring a fire at Grosvenor Chemicals’ Lees Mill Lane, Linthwaite site.
The fire was contained before it reached bulk chemical storage tanks, most of the run-off water was contained on the site and the smoke plume was gradually reducing, the fire service reported,morning-time 24 May.
The Environment Agency started monitoring the air quality as a precautionary measure andwas arranging for some run off water to be removed for treatment by Yorkshire Water. The Agency also advised people not to work downstream in the River Colne and to keep livestock away from the river.
The blaze hit a storage section and involves pesticides and glue-based products. The cause of fire is not yet know.
Grosvenor Chemicals’ operations include formulation, milling & blending and packing of insecticides and fungicides, as well as production of fine chemicals and pharmaceutical intermediates. The company is a subsidiary of the £100-million-turnover Whyte Group – one of the UK’s largest privately owned chemicals distributors, and a manufacturer of pharmaceuticals: both formulation and active ingredients.
The site currently employs around 70 and generates a turnover of around £10 million, including from custom and toll synthesis. Equipment there includes vessels of 50 litre to 5,000 litre capacity, centrifugal separators, paddle and rotary cone driers and distillation units.
