IIggesund Paperboard invests in biofuel

In March Iggesund Paperboard’s new biomass CHP plant in Workington, England came online. The company’s paperboard mill has thereby switched its energy source from fossil natural gas to biomass. The new biomass boiler involves an annual reduction of fossil carbon emissions equivalent to the emissions from more than 58,000 cars, each driven 20,000 kilometres per year. As well as now being self-sufficient in electricity and heat, the mill will also be able to supply both green electricity and heat to local residents. On 28 May the new biomass plant will be inaugurated in the presence of the board of directors of the Holmen Group, the forest industry group to which Iggesund Paperboard belongs.

With its 400 employees Iggesund Paperboard in Workington is the UK’s only producer of folding box board. Incada, the paperboard made at the mill, is constructed of a central layer made of mechanical pulp produced on site, which gives a low weight combined with high stiffness. The outer layers are made of purchased chemical pulp to create high whiteness and good printability.

“For more than a decade now Iggesund Paperboard has invested to raise the standard of what was originally a very ordinary paperboard mill to one that is state of the art,” comments Ola Schultz-Eklund, the mill’s managing director. “Including the 108 million pounds spent on the CHP plant, we have invested more than 200 million pounds in this transformation.”

 Step by step the investments and renovations have raised both the quality and quality consistency of Incada. As a result the mill has found new end uses for its products and gradually improved its profitability.

“At the same time our emissions of fossil carbon dioxide from the production process have now fallen to almost zero, which should reasonably make us an even more interesting option for the large end users, who have more or less promised consumers that they will both declare and reduce the emissions created by the products they sell.”

Incada is used for packaging, book and brochure covers, and other graphical applications. Paperboard packaging is a competitive method of protecting goods throughout the distribution chain from producer to consumer.

“We base our production on a renewable raw material that can later be recycled either in material or energy form,” Schultz-Eklund concludes. “Our manufacturing process meets high environmental standards and our paperboard is an excellent fit in a society which is increasingly moving towards greater sustainability.”