Expansion delayed

Schlotterer’s Plant 3 on hold due to complaints

Schlotterer's Plant 3 will have to wait.

(Bild: Schlotterer/Zuchna Visualisierung)

After numerous notices for the expansion of the sun protection manufacturer Schlotterer in Adnet have already been issued, the Nature Conservation Association and the State Environmental Ombudsman's Office have now filed a complaint against the nature conservation notice. According to Schlotterer, construction has been delayed by a year for the time being. 

The Adnet-based sun shading manufacturer Schlotterer had originally planned to start construction of "Plant 3" in 2025. That is now a thing of the past. The company received the nature conservation notice in June. This means that all permits from the district authority would have been granted and construction could have started the following year. 

Proceedings at the Provincial Administrative Court
However, the Nature Conservation Association and the Provincial Environmental Ombudsman lodged an appeal against the decision. This means that it is now up to the Provincial Administrative Court to decide whether the decision is unlawful. These proceedings will take some time.

According to Schlotterer, the main reason for the delay of one year is that the required forest area could only be cleared in September/October. A decision is not expected before then. This means that it will not be possible to clear the land again until the fall of 2025.  

Managing Director: "Project to be implemented"
 Schlotterer CEO Peter Gubisch says: "We have not yet been able to look at the content of the complaints in detail, but we will examine them very closely. We had already drawn up a specialist report in advance and commissioned a nature conservation expert in order to minimize the impact of the extension on the environment as much as possible. Our project is to be implemented, even if we now have to accept a delay for the second time."

Schlotterer is now rescheduling: instead of 2025, construction will not start until 2026. Plant 3 is scheduled for completion in 2030. The manufacturer then assumes that a full 700 new jobs will be created by 2040. In economic terms, Managing Director Gubisch describes the delay as "not a disaster". Current capacities are not exhausted and not that much is being built, which is why the company is coping well with the delay economically.

Protests in advance
The permits were already granted last year in terms of commercial law and construction law - including a positive water and forestry law review. Numerous public protests against the expansion of the plant on the so-called Adnet fields drew attention in advance under the slogan "Save the Adnet fields". Conservationists had also drawn attention to protected animal species such as sand lizards, bats and Aesculapian snakes in the area in the previous year.