Renishaw announces £50M investment in UK manufacturing site
Gloucestershire-headquartered engineering company Renishaw is investing more than £50 million in its South Wales site, increasing manufacturing capacity while working towards its net zero targets.
The investment will fund the creation of 400,000 sq ft of additional low-carbon buildings at the 193-acre site to the west of Cardiff, consisting of two new production halls and an employee welfare facility. The existing production halls will also be refurbished to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.
Planning permission to almost double the footprint of the site, which was acquired by Renishaw in 2011 and currently accommodates 650 employees, was granted last year by the Vale of Glamorgan council. Following healthy business growth the firm are now proceeding with the plans.
Gareth Hankins, Head of Global Manufacturing, said, “The last two years have highlighted the importance of in-house manufacturing for Renishaw and the control that this gives us in meeting our quality, cost and delivery targets.
“This significant investment by our Board to increase the Group’s production capabilities demonstrates a huge vote of confidence in our manufacturing operations and people, at an exciting time for the business.”
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The construction will be completed in phases, with a 15-month programme of work starting in July 2022 to build the first of the new halls, the welfare facility and supporting infrastructure. The basic shell for the second new production hall will be built by December 2024, to be completed once business levels require it.
The expansion will give Renishaw the additional manufacturing capacity necessary to meet its forecast sales growth in the coming years, increasing the machining operations and product assembly already carried out at the site, while furthering their progress towards their 2028 Net Zero target for Scopes 1&2 GHG emissions.
Scopes are a method of categorising the different types of emissions created by a business’s operations. They first appeared in the Green House Gas Protocol of 2001 and today are the basis for mandatory GHG reporting in the UK.
Scope 1 covers the emissions a company makes directly – for example running vehicles – while Scope 2 consists of those made indirectly, for example in the production of the energy a company uses to run its facilities.
The new buildings will be built with the latest technology and materials to ensure they operate at Net Zero, while aiming to minimise the amount of embodied carbon within the building materials used in construction.
The concurrent refurbishment of the two existing halls will introduce energy efficient cladding and modernised heating systems to further help the company reach its targets, complementing investments in roof-mounted solar panels, car port solar panels, and feasibility studies to assess the viability of wind power.
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