Westlake Chemical Corp. held a dedication ceremony to celebrate the expansion of its Calvert City, Ky., Vinyls Complex.
This ceremony was attended by the Honorable Steve Beshear, governor of Kentucky, James Chao, chairman of the board of Westlake Chemical and Albert Chao, president and CEO of Westlake Chemical. They were joined by various state and local officials, local industry guests and executives and employees of the company.
"We have enjoyed a long and rewarding relationship with Kentucky, operating since 1990 in Calvert City," says Chao. "Our Kentucky operations are a vital hub for our enterprise and over the years, we have invested approximately $1 billion at Calvert City. We were honored to have Gov. Beshear join us today for this special occasion and appreciate the long-standing support of the various state and local officials in the development and growth of our operations in Kentucky. We also thank our employees in Kentucky, as well as our project teams for the successful completion of this expansion."
Westlake Chemical has spent in excess of $300 million into the overall expansion project. This investment included expanding ethylene production capacity and converting its feedstock from propane to ethane to leverage low cost ethane being developed in regional shale gas areas. Additionally, PVC resin capacity was increased to meet the growing demands of global customers.
Westlake Chemical's Calvert City facility employs approximately 400 employees along with 150 core contractors and has been in operation for nearly 25 years. During the peak of the project over 500 construction jobs were created to complete the expansion.
Westlake Chemical Corp.
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