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Brick maker Forterra has dispatched the first load of bricks from its new Desford factory in Leicestershire, the biggest and most efficient manufacturing plant in Europe.
The company has invested £95 million into future-proofing the factory to achieve outstanding overall equipment effectiveness while upgrading production capacity to 185 million bricks per year. Situated just two miles from the M1, new Desford will offer a range of red and buff bricks designed to meet the demands of UK housebuilders.
For Desford’s first despatch, 23,740 Cheshire Red Multibricks were packed onto trucks from Forterra’s Euro 6 fleet, which uses the ultra-fuel-efficient i-save engine to reduce emissions while delivering top transport efficiency, and delivered to housebuilder Taylor Wimpey.
Incorporating state-of-the-art innovations with sustainability mechanisms, robotics hardware and advanced packaging solutions, the factory upgrade is set to emit approximately 25% less carbon dioxide per brick than the old factory, a reduction in emissions that is well in line with the industry drive towards sustainable production.
“With ambitious ESG targets for 2030, we know that sustainability has to be approached holistically,” says Neil Ash, CEO of Forterra, “which is why at Desford we’ve incorporated advanced sustainability mechanisms across all aspects of production, packaging, and delivery.
“The factory’s impressive production capacity will ensure we can manufacture hundreds of millions of bricks per year using a process that has been streamlined to be efficient and sustainable while satisfying the ongoing demands of our customers.
