Heat pumps: in Alsace, the announced closure of BDR Thermea, symbol of a sector in crisis

A redundancy plan symptomatic of a once-thriving market now in doubt. In Alsace, Dutch heating company BDR Thermea announced to its employees on May 20 that it was gradually shutting down its heat pump production in France and closing its Mertzwiller (Bas-Rhin) factory, which specializes in this field. According to the group, which employs 7,000 people worldwide, 370 jobs will be eliminated, including 320 in Mertzwiller.

BDR Thermea's production will be reorganized across a smaller number of sites in Italy, the Netherlands, and especially Slovakia, where labor is much cheaper. To explain its decision, the group, whose heat pumps represent a "significant portion" of its business, explains that it is suffering from a "difficult context" and has incurred "considerable losses" in recent months due to the "collapse" of the market. The announcement is all the more harsh as it comes only three years after an investment of some €20 million in the Mertzwiller site to increase its production capacity by 50%.