below please find a selection of the latest news from the world of pulp and paper.

ipw news

SCA increases the prices on white and brown kraftliner in Europe by €100 per tonne. The new price is valid from April 1, 2022. “We see good demand in the market for kraftliner while supply is limited. Increased costs are evident and must be managed in order to safeguard stable supply of sustainable kraftliner,” says Mikael Frölander, Vice President Marketing and Sales at SCA Containerboard.

Kemira will implement a price increase of 10-30% for selected AKD (alkyl ketene dimer) wax based sizing products in APAC. The price adjustment will be effective immediately or as the existing AKD contracts allow. The decision is triggered by continuous cost increases of main raw materials, energy, logistics and HSE regulatory compliance requirements. AKD wax is the main raw material for AKD sizing products.

Toscotec will take part in Tissue World Miami from 16th to 18th March 2022 to showcase its energy-efficient tissue technology and forthcoming innovations. Toscotec is set to introduce pioneering technologies aimed to decarbonize the tissue manufacturing process and propel the industry’s green transition to using fossil free energy sources. Technologies include 100% hydrogen burners, electric heated Yankee hoods, biomass boilers, and other innovations, which are designed to achieve top machine speed and production capacity.

International technology group Andritz will be presenting its innovative technologies for sustainable tissue production at Tissue World Miami, booth #B20, USA, from March 16 to 18, 2022.

Valmet will launch a new R&D and innovation project called Beyond Circularity, which improves its readiness to support the green transition in Valmet’s customer industries based on the company’s technology vision 2030. The project aims at further strengthening Valmet’s R&D work in order to develop process technologies, automation and services for utilizing renewable materials and recycled, waste and side streams.

Kemira announces price increases for all product lines for all industries in the EMEA region. Costs for all main raw materials, energy and freight have massively increased during recent months and continue to rise. The surge in costs has been further intensified by the ongoing war in Ukraine.

FiberMax is a diagnostic service provided by BTG to identify opportunities to reduce fiber cost and variability, including stabilizing paper quality. In the papermaking process, the control loops for fiber mass flow are crucial for stable production and operations. Fiber furnish needs to be delivered to the headbox with as little variability as possible, otherwise, high fiber, additive and energy costs can result.

For optimized cleaning, Voith introduces the new InduraClean (IDC) product family as part of its BlueLine stock preparation portfolio. The system consists of an improved cleaner bank, which can be combined with both the new InduraClean IDC-4 and optimized InduraClean IDC-5. Depending on requirements, the focus of the modular cleaning technology can be on significantly increased production, energy reduction of up to 50 percent or vastly improved separation efficiency.

The 4evergreen alliance has released its Circularity by Design guideline, the culmination of expert-led research and discussions to provide packaging designers with clear recommendations for how to make fibre-based packaging that is designed for recycling from the very beginning. The guideline was developed by 29 packaging design experts, and reviewed by 114 industry leaders. The guideline represents a critical step in building a circular future for fibre-based packaging.

Stora Enso is starting a feasibility study for the possible conversion of an idle paper machine at its Oulu site in Finland for a high-volume consumer board line. On a successful completion of the feasibility study, an investment decision could be made by the end of 2022 with start-up in 2025. Stora Enso’s strategy is to invest in growth to support the strong, continuous demand for sustainable packaging. This is one of the key strategic focus areas in which the Group is building its market share with both existing and new customers.

Andritz has successfully started up the new A-ConApex™ cooking system supplied to the Altri Group’s Celbi eucalyptus pulp mill in Leirosa, Portugal. The A-ConApex™ continuous cooking technology for fines, rejects and non-wood materials is an optimized cooking solution developed by Andritz. It is the “first of its kind in the world” and can process and utilize almost any type of cellulosic raw material and fines from chip screening and screen room rejects, thus optimizing total use of wood raw materials and maximizing pulp yield.

On March 03, 2022, the Minister President of Lower Saxony, Stephan Weil, visited Drewsen Spezialpapiere in Lachendorf. During his visit, Mr. Weil was able to see how the company is responding to current challenges such as digitalization and the climate crisis and how in the last decades Drewsen has been adapting their portfolio of specialties to be fit for the future. The path now clearly leads in the direction of innovative ideas for sustainable solutions.

The operations of Metsä Group's only production unit in Russia, the Svir sawmill, have been suspended. Wood procurement in Russia for the Svir sawmill and imports to Metsä Group’s Finnish and Swedish mills has also been discontinued.

As part of a long-term global commitment to sustainability and climate protection, Sappi is actively planning the extensive modernisation of the current steam generation boiler at its Maastricht Mill in the Netherlands. With an investment of close to 6 million euros, the mill’s yearly emissions of carbon dioxide will be reduced by some 13 per cent (compared to 2019) following commissioning.

On 15 February 2022, the Final Conference marked the conclusion of the two-year EU project “Turn the Page” – Recruitment strategies to attract young talents in the paper industry (project VS/2020/0016). “Turn the Page” was launched in March 2020 by the Confederation of European Paper Industries (Cepi) in cooperation with IndustriAll European Trade Union.

bio-fibre news

Up to the age of three, a baby uses around 5,000 diapers - and although common disposable diapers score points with their convenient handling, parents are increasingly looking for a healthy and sustainable alternative to these products, which are in most cases synthetic. After all, they cause an enormous amount of plastic waste - in Germany alone, 10 million diapers are disposed of every day.

ABB has been awarded a major contract by NatureWorks, manufacturer of polylactic acid (PLA), a low-carbon bioplastic made from renewable agricultural resources, to automate their new, greenfield plant in Thailand, converting sugar cane to the polylactic acid (PLA) biopolymer, Ingeo^TM.

Ahlstrom-Munksjö, Ellepot, and OrganoClick have partnered to provide 100% biobased and biodegradable solutions to the horticulture market. Organic 2.0 paper pot is an entirely organic-based solution to grow crops on an industrial scale. The new product has allowed the companies to enter the organic crop segment, which is expected to grow exponentially in the coming years.

Metsä Fibre, part of Metsä Group, is to initiate negotiations on changes related to its plans to discontinue the sawn timber production in Kyrö. According to the plans, production will end in the summer of 2022. The change negotiations at the Kyrö sawmill concern all the sawmill’s 73 employees.