STAMFORD, Conn., Sept. 3, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Rain Carbon Inc., a leading global producer of carbon-based products and advanced materials, announces today that it has initiated a damage assessment at its Lake Charles calcination and energy production facility in Louisiana following Hurricane Laura on August 27. Lake Charles and the surrounding Calcasieu Parish took a direct hit from the Category 4 hurricane, and its 150 mile-per-hour winds left much of the region without electricity, sewage treatment or clean water.
"This was the strongest hurricane to hit Louisiana in more than 150 years, and our Lake Charles facility is impacted," said Rain Carbon President Gerry Sweeney. "Our heartfelt prayers and sympathy go out to the people in the region, and we are extremely thankful that all of our employees are safe.
"During the past few days, we have managed to get our teams into the Lake Charles plant and terminal to assess the damage, and while it is not as severe as other companies are reporting, we have significant work to do to get the facility back to 'normal,'" Sweeney explained. "At this time, it is premature to offer an estimated timeline for the restart of the facility or the cost of repairs. The good news is that we have access to well water and generators are on their way to the plant, which should speed our restart. We are also developing alternatives and work-arounds, which should allow us to produce and ship product while repairs are ongoing."
Sweeney added that the duration of needed repairs to the plant and terminal, as well as the inability to transport calcined petroleum coke by barge and ship until the region's debris-clogged waterways are cleared, will necessitate that the company declare force majeure on certain shipments.
"We are doing our best to develop an estimate as to when we will be able to restart production in Lake Charles, and we are working closely with our customers and suppliers so they understand the situation and what we are doing to minimize the possible impact that this outage might cause," Sweeney said.
About Rain Carbon Inc.
Rain Carbon Inc. is a leading vertically integrated global producer of carbon-based and advanced material products that are essential raw materials for staples of everyday life. We operate in two business segments: Carbon and Advanced Materials. Our Carbon business segment converts the by-products of oil refining and steel production into high-value, carbon-based products that are critical raw materials for the aluminum, graphite electrode, carbon black, wood preservation, titanium dioxide, refractory and several other global industries. Our Advanced Materials business segment extends the value chain of our carbon processing through the innovative downstream transformation of a portion of our carbon output and other raw materials into high-value, eco-friendly and advanced-material products that are critical raw materials for the specialty chemicals, coatings, construction, automotive, petroleum and several other global industries. For more information, visit www.raincarbon.com.
SOURCE Rain Carbon Inc.
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