BIOFUELS producer Ensus is taking its Teesside plant offline due to a poor wheat harvest and rising energy costs.

It is the latest setback from the plant, Europe's biggest ethanol facility, which started operations in February 2010 but shut for 15 months from May 2011 until August 2012, due to the impact of cheap imports from the US. The 100 workers employed at the Wilton site and its offices in Yarm are being retained on full pay.

A company spokesman said today: "We regretfully confirm that due to continuing adverse market conditions, we are having to temporarily pause production at our plant.  At this stage, we don’t know how long this pause will be, but we hope that market conditions can improve and are working towards the plant becoming operational again in the near future.
"Unfortunately, the European ethanol market continues to be challenging as the price of ethanol has not risen in line with input costs. In the UK the poor wheat harvest in 2012 has also had an adverse impact on the quality and price of the feed wheat feedstock used within the plant, while rising gas prices have pushed our costs up considerably."

Peter Sopp, chief executive of Ensus, said: “Ensus remains confident in the long term future of the biofuels sector. Ensus is able to supply genuine environmentally sustainable ethanol to satisfy demand, but unfortunately market conditions are working against us at the moment.  We believe it is critical that the Government continues to support the use of high quality sustainable biofuels.”