Breedon Boosts Welsh Roofing Slate Production with £750k Saw Line at Penrhyn

Production is ramping up of Welsh Slate roofing slates at Breedon Group’s Penrhyn Quarry in North Wales, with the installation of a new £750,000 saw line.

The new saw line will help meet sustained demand for the roofing slates, ensuring more of the slate extracted from the company’s slate quarries can be used.

The investment is expected to increase the company’s roofing slate production capacity by an additional 8,000 per week.

Slate Production

Welsh Slate is extracted from the company’s Penrhyn, Ffestiniog and Cwt-y-Bugail quarries, before being broken down into manageable raw block sizes. These are then processed on existing saw lines before being split into roofing slates, either by machine or by skilled operators using a traditional hand splitting method. However, some of the raw blocks have historically been too small to process efficiently.

The saw line – which has been developed and built in-house – will cut and size these smaller raw blocks more efficiently, enabling the production of smaller roofing slates.

The process will reduce waste by ensuring more of the material extracted from the quarries can be used. It will work alongside other automated machines, with Welsh Slate’s well-known hand-splitting also continuing on site.

Barry O’Connor, General Manager at Breedon, said: “Penrhyn Quarry has an enduring and proud history, and this investment demonstrates our commitment to the long-term future of Welsh Slate and ensuring the site continues to supply high-quality roofing materials for many years to come.”

Penrhyn Quarry has been producing roofing slate since the 13^th century and has been a centre of the UK natural stone industry for more than 700 years.

Work on the project began in November, with installation completed earlier this year.

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