FDBusiness.com

Iggesund Paperboard has inaugurated its new biomass boiler at its mill Workington after a £108m investment.

The company’s paperboard mill has 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.

Iggesund said that 400 people work at its mill in Workington and that it is the UK’s only producer of folding box and 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,” said 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.”

According to Iggesund, 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.

“In our investment in this new biomass CHP plant, profitability and reduced climate impact go hand in hand,” Schultz-Eklund explained.

He added: “We know that the cost of fossil-based energy will increase faster than that of biomass, so we regard this investment as a way to stabilise our energy costs.

“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.”