Two ministries–Finance and Energy–have been charged with handling the exit costs of Alutrint.
The Government stated its intent to cease the smelter plant during its budget proposal last week Wednesday. Apart from being a campaign promise, the Finance Minister Winston Dookeran said it was not the best use of the country's natural gas. But stopping the plant comes with legal challenges. Alutrint's chief executive Philip Julien said there are contractual ramifications which he was not at liberty to disclose. He said the Ministry of Energy has undertaken the exercise to quantify the contracts. For the moment, Alutrint, remains operational. Julien said the company had already completed detailed engineering and the site is prepped for construction. He said the decision by the High Court in June 2009 to nullify the grant of the certificate of environmental clearance impeded construction.
However, Alutrint's support structure is also in progress: its 750 mega watt power plant should be completed in the first quarter of 2011 and work is still being done on the port at Brighton. Of the 28 people still employed, 13 of them are contract workers from La Brea. "Alutrint remains committed to serving its shareholders and awaits further directives from them pertaining to the company's continued operations. Bearing in mind the Government is also the majority shareholder for Alutrint, Government is in the best position to comment further on this matter at this time," said Julien. When questioned about the smelter plant last week, Dookeran said Government would look to pursue other industries in the area earmarked for the plant. He said it was part of a wider development plan for the south west peninsula.
Pushed further to explain why the power plant would be underutilsed when its completed or the economics of looking for new industries when one was already being pursued, Dookeran said the decision was a campaign promise. He said it was a loss the Government had to accept as well as its legal burden.