From cone to carton

Many industries in the densely forested Scandinavia and Baltic region rely on their plentiful natural resources to safeguard livelihoods and the viability of entire communities. The future looks good for an integrated forest products company such as Iggesund, in tune with ambitions for a new ‘green economy’. Thanks to technological development and strategic thinking, it could be extracting ever bigger profits from its forests, not so much from traditional board and paper products, but from hi-tech fibre derivatives.

Around 300km from Stockholm, Holmen Group’s Iggesunds Bruk is an integrated pulp mill, timber sawmill and paperboard manufacturer. As an energy generator it will, in a couple of years, become self-sufficient in electricity and fuel with excess to sell on for community heating. The focus now is on advancing latest technologies for converting fibre to biofuel, and cellulose to green chemicals. This strategy to keep expanding the profitable possibilities for the ‘fruits of the forest’ has served the company well for over three centuries.

A diverse product portfolio and technical readiness to transition to new sectors that are more complex and valuable than existing ones, are vital to long-term commercial viability. “Who knows if we will be using cartons in decades to come?” This note of stark reality was voiced recently by Johan Granås, Iggesund’s Technical Product Manager Graphics/Packaging, as he led a posse of packaging press through the process from cone to carton.

The benefits of legal logging and properly managed forests are extensively reported, lately in a special report in The Economist (23 September 2010). The consensus is that forests have a positive influence on global climatic temperatures and air quality and even could impact on weather systems. It all goes to strengthen the forest industries’ argument that strong demand for wood products and forest expansion is a good thing.

Several internal and external layers of control make it hard to conceive how the forest, which makes up 75% of the country, can come under threat: it would amount to ‘biting the hand that feeds you’.

We were shown a section of local forest owned by Iggesund where trees had been harvested some 18 months ago.

‘Clear cutting’ is a term often used disparagingly and associated with indeterminate, uncontrolled harvesting, particularly in rain forests. But this operation was nothing like that, and the careful approach typical of the working practices found in Europe, we were told.

For starters, a cutter will cut to order, basing the tree selection on computer data available on board. Hybrid electric-powered vehicles are now being tested that weigh less than their load capacity. All of the wood already has a buyer and a designated end use: it might be furniture or flooring as well as Invercote high quality cartonboard that global brands specify for the packaging of perfume, high technology products, cigarettes and foods.

A forest snapshot

The 2-3 hectare site contains small stands of trees: a Swedish Forestry ordinance states that at least 150m must be left between standing trees. Older trees have been saved and there is still the occasional stump of an ancient fire-ravaged tree. Elsewhere, a circle of sawn trunks ‘guards’ any feature of cultural significance, which preserves the remains of charcoal burning activity from Iggesund’s past as an ironworks founded in the 1600s. Piles of tops and branches are new features on the landscape, collected for fuel production.

Before mechanical cutters drive their way into the forest there is a painstaking pedestrian survey of the selected area. Yellow ribbons mark the trees to be saved, and wetlands receive special attention along with habitats of rare botanical species. Plans for cutting are mapped and sent to the Swedish forestry authority and held in abeyance for six weeks until they get the official green light.

For every tree taken, three more must be replaced and within a prescribed time limit. A ‘seed tree’ can be left to restock the forest naturally, or individual seedlings planted - by far the more labour intensive option.

A massive nursery brings on some 10 million new pine and spruce plants under cover every year. They are brought on outside and spend a winter in refrigeration to harden off. The forest’s resident moose see the new planting as a veritable ‘smorgasbord’, but as they make great sport, delicious meat and superb leather, no-one is much bothered by the losses.

Water

The careful use and handling of water is in the hands of Anna Mårtensson, who manages Iggesund’s ongoing water projects. A year ago the company completed the third of a three-phase process for cleaning water before it is returned to the sea. The first method is fibre sedimentation. The biological action of organisms mops up more of the residues. And finally, the new chemical treatment using aluminium sulphate harmlessly acts on the oxygenated water, which gradually cools from 30-40ºC over a five-day period.

The company’s proud boast is that nothing now is sent to landfill. Sludge from this final process is all that remains to be dealt with, and Iggesund is experimenting with it as a growing medium for willow. Willow can be used in biofiltration and ecological wastewater treatment systems.

Self-sustaining in energy terms, Iggesund gets the primary power from biomass by the chemical pulping process. A two-year project is well under way to build a huge energy recovery boiler at a cost of €250 million. The aim is to reduce carbon emissions to zero and make the mill self-sufficient in electricity.

Heat recovery is already taking place. The energy produced by the pulping process is used to power the paperboard machines and to dry timber at the sawmill. The excess is sold to heat some 1,000 nearby homes, says Klas Simes, Iggesund’s energy expert. This number is estimated to grow by a factor of 10 as Iggesund develops the potential of the site.