LUCKEY — With a brisk April wind blowing and heavy machines already tearing up nearly 500 acres of a previously vacant Troy Township farm field, officials of the NSG Group on Wednesday began construction on their company’s new float glass plant that will supply glass to First Solar Inc.’s expanding solar panel operations in nearby Perrysburg Township.
And besides the 150 new jobs the glass plant will produce, it will continue the Toledo area’s historic link to the glass industry.
“Specifically, this project is part of a $350 million investment by NSG, not only here but also in Vietnam, where we’re also expanding to serve our key customer, First Solar,” Dick Altman, NSG Group’s regional director of architectural and solar projects, told guests at the construction site that included dignitaries, economic development officials, and NSG customers.
“We’re especially pleased that the investment here gives us the opportunity to add manufacturing jobs here in northwest Ohio,” said Mr. Altman, whose father worked on the floor of the float glass plant in Rossford once owned by Libbey-Owens-Ford, then later Pilkington North American, and since 2006, Tokyo-based NSG Group, which acquired Pilkington.
The new 511,000-square foot glass plant will cost $265 million and be located on Pemberville Road just south of U.S. 20. It will create 110 hourly jobs and 40 salaried positions.
It’s to be operational by the end of 2020 and produce 600 tons of specially coated glass a day or 130,000 tons annually, about 70 percent of which will go to First Solar operations about 10 miles away to the northwest.
The state-of-the-art plant is NSG’s first new U.S. glass-making operation since 1980. It has a glass plant in Ottawa, Ill., that currently supplies First Solar.
Three other states were competing for the new plant, but NSG chose the Luckey site for its numerous advantages.
Todd Huffman, NSG’s overall project manager for solar projects, said the Toledo area’s labor workforce, the site’s close proximity to two natural gas lines, an electric plant and a major power substation on Pemberville Road, and quick access to First Solar, all made the Troy Township site extremely attractive.
But it was a railroad line on the site that put Troy Township over the top.
“So we’re going to make about 600 tons of glass a day. OK? An over-the-road truck can take about 20 tons and a single rail car about 100 tons,” Mr. Huffman said. “Our primary ingredient is sand, which is very heavy. The soda ash we use for our glass comes from Wyoming, and some of the dolomite we use comes from even further away.
“So to get all the material we need by truck, it’s really expensive.”
Toledo’s manufacturing roots in the glass industry are deep, with the city acquiring its “Glass City” nickname through the efforts of turn-of-the-century glass inventor-industrialists like Edward Drummond Libbey, Michael Owens, and Edward Ford setting up operations in Lucas County.
Edward Ford’s original glass plant in Rossford opened in 1899. NSG still makes float glass there with state-of-the-art glass-making technology.
Dan Knecht, who’ll manage the Troy Township facility when it opens, said the new plant will be superior to Rossford in a very important way — the ability to make transparent conductive oxide glass, or “TCO.” First Solar’s will use the specially coated glass for its new and more powerful Series 6 solar panels.
TCO “is a coating that effectively turns glass into wire because you can conduct electricity with it,” Mr. Knecht said.
“The Rossford plant, that primarily produces glass for automotive. This plant will produce flat glass that’s very similar, but then we will put a [TCO] coating on and that coating on a solar panel will help in the harvesting of energy,” Mr. Knecht said.
Mr. Huffman said once the Troy Township plant opens and upgrades are made to NSG’s Vietnam glass plant, which supplies First Solar’s Asian operations, NSG will grow its ability to make TCO glass by 30 percent.
“We need that much more capacity specifically to supply First Solar. Their needs continue to go up,” he said.
First Published April 17, 2019, 6:32 p.m.
