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Machinists: UTC Power realignment may have benefits |
| Fri January 9th, 2009 |
By Howard French, Journal Inquirer
United Technologies Corp.’s decision to pare down the South Windsor plant for its UTC Power division to produce only commercial and transportation-related fuel cells could hold promise for its hourly workers, a Machinists union official said today.
“This will not affect the bargaining unit,” James Parent, assistant directing business representative for the Machinists union’s District 26 said. Parent said that in a meeting between the union leadership and UTC Power officials Thursday, company officials said they might even need to add to the plant’s roster of 148 hourly workers.
The company has not said how the realignment may affect its 350-plus salaried employees.
The reason that the plant may need to boost the number of production workers is the company’s decision to make the South Windsor plant a “center of excellence for fuel cells,” Parent said.
In keeping with that goal, the company has been undergoing what UTC Power officials have called a “refurbishment” of the plant — upgrading production capabilities in an effort that should be completed by March, the company told Parent.
The company announced in December that is in undergoing sweeping changes, including the resignation of President Jan van Dokkum.
Hartford-based corporate parent United Technologies Corp. “is moving to focus its UTC Power unit on fuel cell commercialization and is relocating other sustainable power product lines within the company for faster growth,” UTC spokesman John M. Moran said in December.
J. Michael McQuade, UTC senior vice president for science and technology, took over leadership of UTC Power on Jan. 1 from van Dokkum, who had headed UTC Power since 2002 and agreed to provide transition support for an unspecified period of time.
Company officials have not said where von Dokkum will be going when he leaves UTC Power. Before his tenure at UTC Power, van Dokkum had been president and chief operating officer at North Carolina-based Siemens Power Transmission & Distribution Inc., a subsidiary of Germany’s Seimens AG.
Under the overall plan, UTC’s PureCycle geothermal power generation business is being moved to the Power Systems division of East Hartford-based Pratt & Whitney, Moran said. The space and defense fuel cell business is moving to Hamilton Sundstrand, based in Windsor Locks, teaming it with Hamilton’s other NASA products, including space suits and environmental controls for spacecraft.
The Hamilton move of NASA-related work is the only area where there could be some changes among the union’s hourly workers, according to Parent. Company officials on Thursday said it remains unclear whether the NASA-related work will be moved to Hamilton’s Windsor Locks plant, or remain in South Windsor, where around 10 hourly workers out of the bargaining unit’s 148 members work on those products.
Either way, Parent said, the NASA products will continue to require hourly workers whether it moves or not.
The hourly workers are entering the final year of a three-year labor contract that they approved in December 2006.
Meanwhile, the combined cooling, heat and power system business now done in South Windsor will move to Farmington-based Carrier Corp., along with energy consulting businesses Dome-Tech Inc. and Architectural Energy Corp., Moran said.
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