Serving the Teesside Business Community | 103
/ HARTLEPOOL NEWS
Lucite International, which has
manufacturing operations at Haverton Hill
in Stockton, is the world’s biggest producer
of MMA (methyl-methacrylate), the
precursor of Perspex acrylics.
#TalkingUpTeesside
Cable firm celebrates record
orders after huge contract win
A
Hartlepool firm has won a contract to
supply more than 48 miles of cables
for a massive Belgian windfarm.
Greenland Road-based JDR will
make the cables – as well as a range of
accessories to go with them – for the
SeaMade offshore windfarm.
And it clinched the deal after winning a
competitive tender process.
It prompted JDR bosses to praise
its workforce in Hartlepool for making
products which are such good quality, more
than 900 miles worth has been ordered
worldwide.
The project is the single largest windfarm
being funded and built in Belgium. When
it is complete, it will supply renewable
energy to 485,000 houses.
JDR – which is owned by the TFKable
Group – will design, manufacture and
deliver the aluminium core inter-array
cables, which will connect the 58 Siemens
8.4MW turbines.
They will carry clean-generated electricity
to an offshore substation for transmission
to the offshore grid. They are expected to
go online by the end of this year.
The SeaMade offshore windfarm is
30 miles off the coast of Ostend and
will integrate two wind sites known as
Mermaid and Seastar.
It’s 10 years since JDR opened a new
£20m state-of-the-art Hartlepool plant.
Since then, the firm has grown and the
facility has won a string of high-profile
orders.
NEW CREATIVE INDUSTRIES CENTRE OPENS
An exciting chapter in the regeneration
of Hartlepool has begun with the official
opening of Hartlepool’s new £3m centre for
the creative industries.
“The BIS” – a centre for “creating
Businesses through Innovation and Skills”
- has been created by Hartlepool Borough
Council, bringing a derelict building back
into use through the refurbishment and
enlargement of the Grade II-listed former
Post Office building in Whitby Street.
Hartlepool Borough Council, the Tees
Valley Combined Authority and the Northern
School of Art have worked in partnership
on the project as part of a wider ongoing
council initiative to develop the Innovation
and Skills Quarter around Church Street.
The centre – officially opened by council
leader Christopher Akers-Belcher, chief
executive Gill Alexander and Tees Valley
mayor Ben Houchen – is open to new and
existing business and features 28 units of
various sizes.
Sporting academy and hotel plans agreed
A proposal for a for a huge 150-bed
luxury golf resort hotel has been
teed up by councillors.
Stockton Council’s Planning
Committee were unanimous in their
decision to green light the plans
for the Wynyard Hotel and Sporting
Academy.
The decision means that Wynyard
Golf Club can now build a 150-bed,
three-storey golf resort hotel on
the club’s grounds, complete with
restaurant, conference facilities,
crèche, health club, gymnasium and
spa.
The plans and layouts have been
drawn up by Jomast Developments,
a company which shares a director
with Wynyard Golf Club in Stuart
Monk.
FOUNDATIONS LAID
FOR ‘INNOVATIVE’
HOUSING
The modern building techniques of a
Tees civil engineering firm are set to be
part of one of the UK’s most innovative
house building projects.
Home Group, one of the UK’s largest
providers of high quality housing, health
and social care, has set up Gateshead
Innovation Village, and is working with
five modern methods of construction
(MMC) manufacturers to develop 35
modular houses and panelised houses
as well as six traditional, brick and
mortar homes, which will be assessed
by specialists for a range of issues over
a year-long period.
Seymour Civil Engineering is
contracted by leading regeneration
specialist, ENGIE, which is delivering
the project on behalf of the group,
to look after the roads, sewers and
foundations at the site.
The Hartlepool-based civil engineering
firm has been laying the foundations at
the site and is also responsible for the
internal and external drainage, services
and hard landscaping.