Dow to shutter European ethylene cracker, other assets

• Dow Chemical to shut down three European plants (two in Germany, one in the UK) between 2026–2027 to streamline operations and reduce exposure to high-cost assets.
• Closures are in reponse to weak regional demand and aim to improve profitability by eliminating expensive, energy-intensive production and boosting margins, the company said.

The Dow Chemical Co. is moving forward with plans to permanently cease operations at petrochemical and specialty chemical production sites in Germany and the UK as part of the company’s strategy to maintain competitiveness of its European portfolio.

Dow will shut down three plants—two in Germany and one in the UK—with the aim of boosting overall profitability of its European business, the company said.

In addition to “right-sizing” European production capacity to meet lower regional demand, Dow said it expects the closures—collectively scheduled to begin in mid-2026 for targeted cessation of operations by yearend 2027—will lower the company’s exposure to merchant sales and eliminate expenditures required to operate the higher-cost, energy intensive assets.

Of the three planned shutdowns, the most notable involves subsidiary Dow Olefinverbund GMBH’s naphtha steam cracker in Böhlen, Germany, which is due to end operations in fourth-quarter 2027.

While Dow no longer discloses capacities of its individual assets, the operator last confirmed to OGJ an official ethylene production capacity on the Böhlen cracker of 560,000 tonnes/year (OGJ, Ethylene Report, July 2015).

Alongside the naphtha cracker, the operator’s other proposed European closures include Dow Olefinverbund’s chlorakali and vinyl assets at Schkopau, Germany, in fourth-quarter 2027, and subsidiary Dow Silicones UK Ltd.’s basics siloxanes plant at Barry, Vale of Glamorgan, Wales, UK, in mid-year 2026.

Potential plant decommissioning and demolition activities, however, could continue into 2029 as needed, according to Dow.

The operator said the European plant closures will coincide with shutdowns of “certain corporate and other” unidentified assets across Dow’s global portfolio.

The scheduled shutdowns—forewarned of in the operator’s first-quarter 2025 results released in April—will improve the company’s ability to supply profitable derivative demand and optimize margins, resulting in operating EBITDA uplift beginning in 2026, ramping to 50% of a targeted $200 million by yearend 2027, with full delivery by 2029 for a cash outlay of about $500 million over 4 years, Dow said.

"Our industry in Europe continues to face difficult market dynamics, as well as an ongoing challenging cost and demand landscape," said Jim Fitterling, Dow’s chairman and chief executive officer.

Characterizing the plant closures as part of the company’s decade-long strategy of taking proactive actions across its higher-cost and less-competitive assets, Fitterling said the shutdowns will not deter from Dow’s commitment “to realizing the value of our incremental growth investments and enhancing profitability and cash flow through more than $6 billion in near-term cash support."

Dow said the proposed asset shutdowns will impact 800 employees that will come in addition to a workforce reduction of about 1,500 roles announced in January, the latter of which resulted in cost savings of about $1 billion.

Downstream feedstock impacts?

Dow remained silent on possible impacts to the regional feedstock market following closure of the Böhlen cracker, on which—according to Dow’s website—other operators in the region have historically relied for raw materials used in manufacturing activities at their respective plants, some of which are co-located at the Dow Olefinverbund-operated ValuePark in Schkopau and Böhlen, Germany.

In Dow Olefinverbund’s latest edition of its HelloNeighbor newsletter—a publication for neighboring communities in central Germany—published in November 2024, the operator confirmed startup of UK-based Synthomer PLC’s startup of a former and Synthomer-revamped hydrocarbon resin (HR) production plant at the Dow ValuePark in Böhlen previously owned by Osaka-based Arakawa Chemical Industries Ltd. subsidiary Arakawa Chemical Industries GmbH.

Upon announcing acquisition of the former HR plant in January 2024, Synthomer confirmed it would invest in renovating the plant to make raw materials intended to bolster its supply chain for HR production at its operations in Middelburg, the Netherlands.

In confirming the plant’s completed overhaul and recommissioning in November 2024, Dow Olefinverbund said the renovated HR plant—operated by Dow for Synthomer—was continuing to receive all its feedstock from the Böhlen cracker.

According to Dow’s website, the Böhlen cracker serves as “the heart” of Dow Olefinverbund’s olefin network in Germany, with the plant’s production of ethylene and propylene shipped via 1,300 km of Dow-operated pipelines across the system to other Dow and third-party plants in the region for use as feedstock in manufacturing of hygiene and construction products, as well as high-quality plastics.