UTILITIES
Natural gas price increases
The monthly natural gas price for customers who have chosen Dominion’s Standard Choice Offer (SCO) or those who don’t choose their own supplier is increasing for December.
Effective Tuesday, the identical SCO and Standard Service Offer (SSO) prices will be $4.30 per thousand cubic feet (mcf). The new rates are 23 cents (or 5.6 percent) higher than the November SCO/SSO price of $4.07. However, it is still 6 cents or 1.4 percent lower than the price a year ago.
The average SCO/SSO residential customer’s bill for December would be $113.34, up 55 cents, 0.5 percent, from $112.79 in December 2011, the utility said.
Residential customers pay the same usage-based charges (to deliver gas to a residence) and monthly service fee, regardless of whether customers choose their own supplier or stay with Dominion. That flat fee, approved by the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio, is $20.95.
RUBBER
Goodyear receives honor
The Thomson Reuters business news service named Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co among its 2012 Top 100 Global Innovators.
This is the second year in a row that Thomson Reuters has recognized Akron-based Goodyear on the list. The award is based on a series of proprietary patent-related metrics that measure innovation activity.
The full Thomson Reuters Top 100 Innovators list is at www.top100innovators.com.
New board member
Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. on Tuesday announced the newest, and 12th, member of its board of directors.
John E. McGlade, 58, is chairman, president and chief executive officer of Allentown, Pa., industrial gas supplier and manufacturer Air Products & Chemicals Inc.
He has been president and chief executive officer of Air Products since 2007 and its board chairman since 2008. He joined Air Products in 1976. The company says it is the world’s largest supplier of hydrogen and helium gases.
A native of Bethlehem, Pa., McGlade has a bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering and an MBA from Lehigh University.
AUTOS
GM to shut Lordstown early
General Motors says it will shut down its Lordstown plant one week ahead of its regularly scheduled holiday break.
The Youngtown Vindicator reports that the Dec. 17-21 shutdown will leave three shifts of workers without pay for that week. The plant already was scheduled to close Dec. 21 in a predetermined contractual agreement with the United Autoworkers union. It will reopen Jan. 7.
GM officials said the move is to help curb Chevrolet Cruze inventory heading into a traditionally sluggish period for compact car sales.
UAW Local 1112 President Glenn Johnson said workers will be allowed to file for unemployment compensation to reclaim a portion of their earnings for the week.
The workers will be paid for the regularly scheduled holiday break.
ACQUISITIONS
Saint-Gobain completes deal
Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics in Aurora has completed the acquisition of Twin Bay Medical, a Michigan manufacturer of BarbLock brand products — flexible tube retainers and seal tubing connections for biopharmaceuticals manufacturing. Twin Bay also makes single-use components for the industry.
Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
The Aurora unit of French industrial giant Saint-Gobain said Twin-Bay Medical’s production plant in Williamsburg, Mich., its development organization and all the employees working for the company are included in the transaction.
Twin Bay Medical said on its website that the BarbLock retainers make cable ties, hose clamps and metal band clamps obsolete.
The world’s largest manufacturer of building materials, Saint-Gobain has 600 workers in the Akron area at facilities in Hudson, Stow, Aurora and Hiram.
BUYOUTS
FedEx to reduce staff
FedEx will be offering some employees up to two years of pay to leave the company next year.
The voluntary program is part of an effort by the second-biggest package delivery company to cut annual costs by $1.7 billion within three years.
Employees who volunteer for the program will receive four weeks of pay for every year of service, capped at two full years of base pay.
Those eligible will be notified in February, and have until April to apply. They’ll be informed in May if they are accepted. The first wave of employees will leave May 31.
Compiled from staff and wire reports