Westlake to close North American chlorovinyl units and styrene plant, $415 million charge
Westlake approved plans to shut its PVC plant in Aberdeen, Mississippi, a VCM plant and one chlor-alkali unit in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and its styrene plant in Lake Charles, with cessations expected in December 2025 and about 295 jobs affected. The company expects total pre-tax costs of about $415 million, mostly noncash charges, with a substantial portion recognized in the fourth quarter of 2025, which will weigh on reported results even as the company projects lower annual costs and higher cash flow from 2026.
Key points
- Cessation of operations expected in December 2025; workforce reduction of about 295 employees.
- Total pre-tax costs of about $415 million: about $357 million noncash, about $25 million severance, and about $33 million plant shutdown costs.
- Investor slides expect an annual EBITDA improvement of about $100 million and free cash flow savings of about $175 million in 2026.
- Company says cash outflows will continue over several years and may disclose additional charges later.
The filing
Written by AI (Anthropic Claude, claude-haiku-5-5) on Nov 8, 2026, 1:17 AM ET, from the text of the filing and its press-release exhibits only. Written later: this filing was briefed after the fact, when past filings were added to the site, so the brief may be read with hindsight; the filing itself is the record of what was known on December 15, 2025.
Briefs are written by AI from the filing text (each brief's own page names the model) and can contain mistakes — open the filing before acting on anything. Impact (1-5) and tone are the model's reading of the filing for shareholders, not a price forecast. Not investment advice.