Further curtailment at LP's Thomasville mill

3 November 2008

Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (LP) plans to extend the curtailment of its new OSB facility in Thomasville, Alabama and wants to change a deal it made with Clarke County and Alabama officials that prevents it from laying off the mill's 138 employees.
In planning for the OSB mill, LP agreed to employ 130 people in exchange for a US$17m incentive package.
The US$250m facility, which has an annual capacity of 750 million ft2 was still in a start-up phase in May when an explosion seriously injured four workers and caused US$4m worth of damage.
LP told county officials the mill would not resume operations on October 20 as scheduled, but would keep it closed for at least another six months pending an improvement in market conditions.
The Thomasville facility is the largest OSB plant wholly owned by LP and represents 13.6% of the company’s total OSB capacity of 5.5 billion ft2.