Gypsum industry news

Ireland/UK: Belgium-based Etex has appointed Oliver Cripps as its Head of Sustainability, UK and ireland to support its brands, including Siniat. His role will be to push the company’s sustainability agenda, heighten the environmental credentials of its operations and products and decrease reliance on raw materials.

Cripps has worked for 25 years in the sustainability sector in industries including tourism, land management and manufacturing. His previous jobs include Senior Sustainability Manager at Dyson Technology, where he led sustainability for the New Product Innovation and Research teams, and experience working with global furniture manufacturer, MillerKnoll to support research and development and corporate sustainability.

UK/Ireland: Knauf UK and Ireland’s haulage contractor Nicholls has switched to using renewably generated liquefied natural gas (LNG) to power its trucks. The transition should reduce Knauf’s Scope 3 emissions generated by transporting its raw materials and products. Knauf’s emissions from deliveries represent roughly 23% of all Scope 3 emissions for the UK business.

Nicholls started trialling LNG powered trucks in 2018 and then built a local refuelling site. It currently uses 29 trucks that run on LNG. The haulage company still uses diesel power vehicles for some routes depending on distance and infrastructure.

Ireland: Belgium-based Etex has acquired multi-disciplinary engineering consultancy Evolusion Innovation. The group says that the new subsidiary will join its New Ways division. It said that the acquisition is ‘another step’ in the execution of its ambition to become a global leader in offsite construction.

Evolusion Innovation develops and certifies construction materials and components and high-rise building systems. It employs 40 people at its Cork headquarters in County Cork.

Ireland: France-based Saint-Gobain subsidiary Gyproc has applied to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to have its sulphate discharge licence for its Drummond, County Monaghan, mine increased by 530% to 1250mg/l from 200mg/l. The Irish Independent newspaper has reported that the higher level ‘would not occur year-round,’ according to the company, but ‘only at certain times.’ The EPA is ‘awaiting additional information from the applicant in order to make a decision.’

Ireland: Gyproc has confirmed that it did not carry out subsidence monitoring on a disused County Monaghan gypsum mine which subsided in September 2018, damaging community buildings and sports fields. The company revised its position on the checks after a ‘fresh and detailed analysis of records’ following an investigation by the Irish Independent. The newspaper reported that, having recorded a slowing of subsidence to millimetres per year, the company decided that six monthly monitoring, the norm in the area according to the Department of Communications, Climate Action and the Environment, was unnecessary.

Gyproc’s activities further caused a road to fall into a sinkhole in December 2018.

The subsidiary of Saint-Gobain has applied to install an open cast mine on a site including that of the erstwhile popular sports facility.

Ireland: Gyproc has launched what it says is the country’s first wallboard recycling service at its Kingscourt plant in County Cavan. The subsidiary of Saint-Gobain hopes to recycle 0.5Mt of wallboard by 2028. It has spent Euro1.5m on the upgrade to the plant and it has increased the number of employees to 220.

“We’re very proud to be the first and only plasterboard manufacturer in the country to offer recycling of our products on the island,” said Brian Dolan, Managing Director of Gyproc. “As a market leader in this sector we are determined to be at the forefront of innovation in new products and services, and in the sustainability and environmental benefits of those services.” The manufacturer sources gypsum from its Drummond mine in County Monaghan.