The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Mossmorran ‘in safe hands’ insists new plant operator
The man charged with overseeing a £140 million investment at Mossmorran has insisted the project is in safe hands.
When Fife Ethylene Plant (FEP) temporarily shuts down in April to enable improvement work to begin, Maarten ten Doesschate will take the reins of his 14th major investment programme for plant operator ExxonMobil.
Hundreds of specialist workers will descend on the site near Cowdenbeath to complete various strands of the ambitious project, with work on an advanced elevated flare tip expected to vastly reduce the amount of noise and vibration emanating from the plant during periods of flaring.
That, for long-suffering neighbouring residents, cannot come quickly enough.
“While our operations have always been safe, we know our reliability has not been as good as it can be,” Maarten said.
“This has led us to use our flare too often, which we know frustrates our local communities.
“This investment will improve our reliability by overhauling existing equipment, installing thousands of new parts and introducing the latest versions of the technologies available.
“We have a very skilled and knowledgeable team here at FEP who will be joined by over 850 specialist contractors.
“The work has been carefully planned and will be delivered to the highest standard.”
Maarten began his career with ExxonMobil in the Netherlands where he obtained a Masters in chemical engineering, and has worked with the company for over 35 years in a variety of roles.
Among his previous posts were technical and plant manager in Rotterdam, start-up and safety manager in Singapore and investment project manager in
Beaumont and Baytown in the USA, and Antwerp in Belgium.
Maarten, who is married and has two grown-up children who live in the Netherlands, likens the forthcoming programme to a major service on your car – but on a much bigger scale.
An estimated 300,000 hours of work will be delivered, and he has reassured Fifers that regular updates will be provided as the project progresses.
“We will share more detail with you as the project moves forward, so please keep an eye on our social media and website for details,” he added.
Gas engineers are to hold weekly protests in a dispute over new contracts. Scottish Gas workers staged action in Leven, yesterday in protest at alleged threats to fire staff who refuse to accept pay cuts.
One Fife-based employee said he and his colleagues were distraught at the company’s attempts to change their terms and conditions, and claimed they had been betrayed.
“Last year when lockdown came we were classed as key workers,” said the man, who asked to remain anonymous.
“There are engineers who went into Covid-live properties to fix people’s heating to keep them warm when they were ill.
“They were doing that while behind our backs the company was plotting to slash our terms and conditions.”
The man said he and his colleagues had been proud to work for Scottish Gas and volunteered to deliver food parcels in the company’s name to people in isolation.
“We did that while on furlough and this is how we’re repaid,” he said.
Scottish Gas and British Gas, owned by energy giant Centrica, have been accused of “divide and conquer tactics” to bully staff into signing up to new terms before they are effectively sacked and brought back into employment on new contracts.
The “fire and rehire” row affects 20,000 employees across the UK.
The changes are being fiercely opposed by the GMB union.
The Fife worker said: “Under the new terms we’ll get paid less for doing more.”
Workers have been staging strike action against the proposals, which includes starting their working day on arrival at their first job, excluding travelling time.
The Fife worker said many people were being asked to work 156 hours a year extra, without any more pay.
“Service engineers are starting earlier and working longer hours,” he said.
“The protest is gathering pace and we’ll be here every Monday and Friday.
“We just feel we’ve had the heart ripped out of us and we’re distraught.”
Leven Labour councillor Colin Davidson supported the workers’ protest yesterday near the Diageo plant, describing the company’s actions as outrageous.
“It’s awful that during a pandemic, a company that has made almost £1 billion in profit worldwide is even contemplating a change to workers’ conditions,” he said.
Centrica insists it is trying to protect jobs and that staff have only been asked to work three hours extra per week.
It described the change as “reasonable”.
A Centrica spokeswoman said 83% of employees had already agreed to the new terms.