Green Light for WuXi Irish Pharma Plant

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Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland)--Chinese pharmaceutical company WuXi Biologics (Jiansu, China) has been granted permission to construct a new effluent balancing and resource recovery plant (EBRRP) at its plant at Dundalk Science and Technology Park in County Louth in Ireland.

On a 19-acre site the company will build three covered structures containing 12 process tanks, located within concrete bunds with metal stairways and platforms for access, and connected to an odor-treatment facility. Excavated material will be reused as a landscaped spoil heap within the site. The project will include the installation of a sludge dewatering facility while there will be a separate, single-storey administration and process building with roof-mounted solar panels and rainwater-harvesting tank constructed nearby. The project is expected to cost more than US$30 million. Industrial Info is tracking a number of other projects at the site.

WuXi's Irish facility is home to 800 employees and offers commercial-scale biologics manufacturing services from its two key drug substance manufacturing suites: a 48,000-liter (L) fed-batch suite (MFG6) and a 6,000-L perfusion suite (MFG7). It began operations in 2021 and is part of the European Union's (EU's) billion-dollar "Factory of the Future" public-private partnership (PPP) for advanced manufacturing research and innovation.

Earlier this year the Dundalk site successfully completed the first manufacturing run at its drug substance facility MFG7, paving the way for large-scale commercial manufacturing projects. The run reached 16,000-L scale by combining four 4,000-L single-use bioreactors. It was not only the first successful manufacturing run for the MFG7 facility, but also the largest manufacturing scale for WuXi Biologics to date. In related pharma news, Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) (New Brunswick) is seeking permission to expand its major Irish manufacturing facility in Ringaskiddy in County Cork. It is looking to build a two-storey extension adjacent to the production building, comprising a floor area of 294-square meters. It will allow for the installation of new equipment to replace end-of-life appliances. The Ringaskiddy operation employs 700 staff and manufactures cancer therapies and medicines for immune-related diseases.

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Industrial Info Resources (IIR) is the leading provider of industrial market intelligence. Since 1983, IIR has provided comprehensive research, news and analysis on the industrial process, manufacturing and energy related industries. IIR's Global Market Intelligence (GMI) helps companies identify and pursue trends across multiple markets with access to real, qualified and validated plant and project opportunities. Across the world, IIR is tracking over 200,000 current and future projects worth $17.8 Trillion (USD).