DSME plant in Trenton for sale
Provincial government is hoping to attract a new buyer
Almost two years to the day, the Liberal government is back in Trenton hoping to generate some interest in the town’s former railcar plant.
This time, Nova Scotia Business Minister Geoff MacLellan visited the area for an up-close look at a facility that has been mothballed for two years after DSME Trenton shut down its wind tower production in February 2016.
MacLellan doesn’t mince words about the visit, clearly stating that he hopes some media attention on the facility will attract a new buyer because the best-case scenario is to see it sold and operating again.
“It’s been two years and with the receivership process we have allocated $150,000 per month in the operational investment here in DSME just to keep it status quo, so for us the investment has certainly been important to keep things intact for the receiver to do their work but we are getting to the point where we have to make a decision,” he said during a tour of the plant.
DSME Trenton Ltd. (DSTN) closed the plant Feb. 19 and it was placed in receivership shortly afterwards. DSME South Korea said it closed the plant because it was undergoing a major company restructuring that included closing the Trenton location.
The Korean company purchased the former rail car facility
in 2010 in hopes of breaking into the North America Wind Energy sector but it did not achieve the results it had hoped for in the five years. Under the former NDP government, the facility received $56.3 million in provincial money and Nova Scotia owned 49 per cent of the shares. However, in January 2016 the Liberal government said it was not interested in investing more money in the company and within less than a month the company shut the doors.
MacLellan said there is still interest in the plant, but potential companies failed to meet all of the points required in the receivership process.
“It requires a down payment be made and that hasn’t happened and we are not there yet,” he said. “It is all speculation and kind of wishful thinking until we get the deposit and we get a group that is
serious and then we can move to the next step.”
The tour Thursday proved to him that the area and plant are still viable.
“The turbine construction area is largely intact and the investments made there are visible,” he said. “The older buildings most likely require remediation and demolition. There is a lot of different parts to this. Some aspects would be viable for the private sector and some wouldn’t.”
He said a worst-case scenario is liquidation which would require the sale of assets and land. A second option would be to identify the assets and figure out individually which ones would be of interest to a private sector operator.
“For us the best-case scenario is to find a buyer and purchase this site total.”