FLARING from the Fife Ethylene Plant overnight caused concern for people in the Cowdenbeath-Lochgelly area.

ExxonMobil confirmed this morning that following the loss of steam generation, they are currently experiencing a significant process outage, which resulted in high volume flaring.

Plant boss Jacob McAlister said: "Our first priority remains the safety of our people and our surrounding communities, followed closely by minimising the community impact of flaring.

"We are now developing plans to safely shut down plant operations to allow us to execute the necessary maintenance and eliminate flaring.

"We apologise unreservedly for any concern that this event may have caused and will update further as timelines become clearer.

"SEPA has been advised in accordance with our regulatory responsibilities".

The Mossmorran Action Group Facebook page had a number of posts from people airing their concern about the flaring and noise associated with it along with smoke.