To continue in this direction, the industry needs advanced solutions to recover even more material, but also modular solutions capable of adapting to changes in the market. Changes in consumer habits have transformed the composition of the fibrous material stream entering sorting centres: the volume of brown cardboard has risen sharply in the face of falling tonnages of newspapers and magazines.

Pellenc has developed CNS Brain on this basis. The add-on is designed to use artificial intelligence to improve detection accuracy and sorting performance. The combination of deep learning and NIR/VIS should enable the optical sorting machines developed by Pellenc ST to handle even the most complex sorting processes. In addition, the small distance between the detection head and the ejector should ensure very high ejection accuracy and reduce the loss of good products by half.

According to the manufacturer, CNS Brain does not require any additional hardware. It is available as an option for new machines or as a retrofit for the Mistral+ CONNECT and COMPACT+ product ranges.

This means that waste accumulated during paper production, for instance pulper ropes (also referred to as pulper waste) and rejects, are re-used and recycled. Shredding pulper ropes is one of the most important process steps for recovering material streams for recycling and for thermal recovery. Laakirchen Papier AG, a member of the international Heinzel Group, has been using an Untha XR3000C mobil-e shredder for its pulper ropes for several years.

“Due to their shape and consistency, pulper ropes are notoriously difficult to process. However, they are well worth the effort as they contain precious materials for recycling, such as metal, as well as other waste materials that may be used as alternative fuels in energy production,” says Daniel Wresnik, Team Leader XR/ZR Sales & Demonstrations DACH Region at Untha.

Pulper ropes: a challenging source of valuable materials

Pulper ropes are a by-product of wastepaper recycling. Their name derives from the term “pulper”, a large vat that is used in paper mills for dissolving paper and pulp. Wastepaper usually also contains impurities such as plastics (foils, stickers), small metal parts (staples and paper clips) as well as textiles (threads from bookbinding) etc. To remove these from the pulp, wire ropes are lowered into the pulper and the contaminants get caught up in them. This is how the so-called “pulper ropes” are produced. At Laakirchen Papier AG, these ropes are four to seven metres long and have a diameter of up to 70 centimetres. When they are removed from the pulper, they are wet, which creates yet another obstacle for their further processing. However, the material contained in the pulper ropes is valuable and can be recycled and reused. Metals, for instance, may be sold and recycled. The other residual materials are used as alternative fuels in energy production. In this way, a challenging waste product may be put to commercial use.

Untha XR class for efficient shredding

To separate the individual materials and prepare them for recycling or alternative fuel production, the pulper ropes must first be shredded. The UNTHA shredders of the XR class rise to the challenge: The models XR2000/3000 (mobile and stationary) are particularly energy-efficient due to the innovative UNTHA Eco Power Drive, shredding pulper ropes to a homogeneous granulate in a single-step process. The slow-running cutting unit makes single-shaft shredders particularly resistant towards non-shreddables as well as low-maintenance. The fully automated pusher system ensures continuous material feed. With the C-cutting system, the XR shreds pulper ropes down to a defined fraction size of 50–150 mm, depending on the perforated screen used. With an overbelt magnet, metal parts are pulled out from the granulate. The separated materials may then be used for recycling (metal) as well as for thermal recovery (plastics, textiles).

The paper industry relies on the Untha XR3000C mobil-e

Laakirchen Papier AG is part of the internationally active Heinzel Group and produces up to 780,000 tonnes of environmentally friendly publication and packaging paper every year, made exclusively from recycled fibres. 98.3 percent of production waste is used for material or thermal recovery. For shredding the 25 tonnes of pulper ropes produced daily, Laakirchen Papier has been using an UNTHA XR3000C mobil-e for several years. “The UNTHA XR fulfils all our expectations. The shredder is energy-efficient and powerful at the same time. The output is extremely well-suited for material and thermal recovery, enabling us to make commercial use of the waste we produce. This helps us to pursue our goals in terms of sustainability and conservation of resources”, says Johann Stadlmayr, project manager at Laakirchen Papier AG.

However, while the paper industry has made significant strides in increasing the sustainability of its production by increasing the recycled content of its products, there is much room for improvement. In fact, a smaller portion of paper produced than might be expected is recovered for recycling, despite separate waste collection being widespread. For example, in Germany, as much as 20% of the paper produced is not returned into the recycling value stream – and a part of this paper is discarded in mixed waste streams.

“Regulations mandating the minimum content of recycled material in new paper products will require a significant increase in recovered paper for recycling. Even if we were to recycle all the paper collected separately with the existing process, there would not be enough to meet these targets,” explains Annika Ludes, Product Engineer at Stadler. An award-winning research initiative, the EnEWA project, is looking at a solution to fill the gap by unlocking the untapped potential of obtaining recyclable paper from the lightweight packaging, residual waste and commercial waste streams. While the project analysis is based on the paper from mixed waste streams as they are collected in Germany, the solution it is developing will be applicable, with some adaptations, to local situation in other countries. The project kicked off in December 2021 and is due to be completed in November 2024.

“Participating in the EnEWA project is important for us at STADLER. Research projects such as this help us in our search for ways to support the recycling industry as we evolve towards a circular economy,” adds Annika Ludes. “We want to drive change, build these plants to expand the sources of secondary fibers for the paper industry. We also want to work with packaging producers to design packaging that is better for recycling.”

Recovering paper from mixed waste streams

The members of the EnEWA project – Universität Siegen, RWTH Aachen University, Leipa Group, Propakma, Tomra and Stadler – are developing a solution for recovering and recycling paper from the lightweight packaging, residual waste and commercial waste streams. They have set clear objectives: increase recycling rates in paper production and reduce primary energy requirements and CO2 emissions. The goal is to achieve an overall recovered paper return rate of 90% – including both separate paper collection and special collection systems, which today have a 78% return rate, and the residual, commercial and lightweight packaging streams from which barely a small part of paper is currently recovered.

The project is also looking at what can be done to create the conditions for maximizing the amount of paper returned to the recycling loop. This includes discussions with German and EU regulatory authorities with recommendations for updating waste management guidelines to improve the waste streams feeding the sorting process; communication campaigns aimed at raising awareness among consumers about the correct separation of their household waste; and collaboration with producers for the design of packaging that is better for recycling.

The task for Stadler in the project is to provide, in collaboration with Tomra Recycling, technical solutions to extract paper from the mixed streams and sort it into different paper qualities for recycling. Alena Spies, M.Sc., Research associate at the Chair of Anthropogenic Material Cycles of RWTH Aachen University, comments: “Stadler brings its great experience in waste processing technology and plant engineering, which are of great importance for the holistic consideration of material cycles and the development of recycling processes on an industrial scale towards a circular economy. For us, its most important contribution has been the joint planning and implementation of industrial-scale sorting trials at its Test and Innovation Center.”

Industrial-scale trials at Stadler test center

In March, Stadler completed extensive industrial-scale trials at its Test Center in Slovenia to identify and resolve the issues arising in sorting paper from lightweight packaging, residual and commercial waste streams. The sorting process begins with the income stream going through Stadler’s ST2000 ballistic separator, followed by optical sorting with Tomra Recycling’s Autosort.

The process was tested on waste collection samples from different areas of Germany, and in different conditions that may affect the sorting process, such as wet or dirty materials. “This is important because the waste collection processes vary from country to country, but also domestically at regional level, and even on a seasonal basis. Also, waste from these streams is often dirty and may be wet. This means that the solution must have the flexibility to manage this variability,” says Annika Ludes.

The tests have generated vast amounts of data, and the analysis is still in the early stages. The RWTH Aachen University team is examining the results of manual and sensor-based analysis of the waste streams to get a good understanding of the ballistic separator’s operation with these materials. It is analysing separation of three main streams: pure paper, separation of paper out of the plastic waste stream, and separation of plastics out of paper.

In terms of the sorting process, the analysis so far has revealed that every paper fraction from the different waste streams has its own characteristics and that, due to its modularity and the range of possible settings, the STADLER STT2000 can be used effectively for sorting non-separated collected paper.

Samplings made earlier in the project to analyse the material composition and paper content of the different waste streams have revealed that approximately 50% of the paper in the lightweight packaging stream could have been disposed of within the separate paper collection. This finding highlighted the need to address the waste collection processes to ensure a more effective separation of the streams and, consequently, higher paper recovery rates.

The project is also looking beyond the sorting process, as Alena Spies explains: “Different dissolution and stock preparation options as well as a procedure for the hygienisation of biological contamination and the separation of hazardous substances have been investigated. An additional focus is on the recovery of rejects that arise during paper recycling processes. Last year, a complete recycling process was conducted from the separation of paper and board from lightweight packaging waste until the production of new cardboard, including several sorting and processing steps. In addition, the project is continuously accompanied by an ecological and economical assessment and the transfer of knowledge of the results to the paper industry. With this project, we hope to establish the developed recycling process into the paper industry to achieve a material recycling of paper and board from lightweight packaging, residual and commercial waste.”

The paper industry has already improved its carbon footprint through optimization of their plants and reducing the energy requirements in the reprocessing of recovered paper. By redirecting the paper from the residual, commercial, and lightweight packaging streams into the recycling loop, the process developed by the EnEWA project has a potential, according to initial calculations, to save some 270,000t of CO2 a year.

Today, the family business, Rua Papel Gestión, is a respected company with an active presence in different European and Asian countries, selling products from the company’s three plants in Catalonia, Spain.

The company has purchased a new Bobcat L85 compact wheel loader for its Sant Andreu de la Barca paper recycling center. In this plant, some 38,000 tonnes of paper and cardboard from printing presses are processed annually, and for this, they needed a machine with power and versatility, but also compact enough to maneuver easily inside the warehouse and between the rows and columns of stored paper bales.

The Bobcat L85 loader is used to handle materials to feed the presses. But thanks to its power, the operators who handle it are already thinking of getting more out of it, equipping it with forks to load bales of paper. They do not rule out putting a grapple on the machine in the future as well. The characteristics of this machine give them great versatility to deal with the various needs of daily activity at the plant.

The L85 is equipped as standard with the hydraulic Quick-Tach system, which is compatible with the most commonly used standard couplers in the sector, allowing the use of high flow attachments. The advanced attachment control allows the operator to change the control pattern of the machine with the push of a button. This offers independent control of engine speed and machine travel speed. Thanks to the 7-pin connector, the operator can control even the most complicated attachments intuitively and efficiently.

The L85 has a 50.7 kW engine, which allows it to offer a tipping load of 3151 kg, and comes equipped as standard with features that allow the operator to work with great comfort and exceptional productivity. 

The company has installed two Starlinger PET recycling lines in its facility in Warangal, Telangana state. Ganesha Ecopet plans to supply the produced rPET granulates under its newly introduced brand enterprise Go Rewise. Launched under the umbrella of one of India’s rPET industry leaders, Go Rewise is committed to supplying the highest quality rPET products that are produced in a resource-efficient process.

The first Starlinger recycling line, a recoSTAR PET 165 H-VAC, processes washed PET bottle flakes for the Go Rewise polyester filament yarn applications and reaches an output of approx. 14,000 tons per year. When using recycled PET for filament yarn production, it must meet the highest quality standards. Thus, all foreign particles and polymers have to be removed before the extrusion process. To achieve optimum melt purity for extrusion, Starlinger has developed a special candle filter for fibre applications, called Rapid Sleeve Changer (RSC). It ensures finest melt filtration down to 15 μm and achieves a throughput of up to 2000 kg per hour. The filter elements can be changed without interrupting production, which significantly reduces melt loss and machine downtime.

With the second Starlinger recycling line, Ganesha is producing food-grade rPET resins. “Through venturing into bottle-to-bottle recycling, we want to close the loop and move from secondary recycling into primary recycling”, said Prashant Khandelwal, Senior Vice President of Go Revise. “Bottle-to-bottle recycling reduces the need for virgin plastic and thus substantially decreases the plastic burden on the planet. It also uses approximately 80 % less resources – water, energy, et cetera – for producing a new bottle than it is the case with virgin resin. Earlier, brand owners used to be apprehensive about including rPET in their packaging product, but with the emergence of new technologies and strict regulations by governments, the demand for rPET is increasing very fast.”

The Starlinger recoSTAR PET 165 HC iV+ bottle-to-bottle recycling system installed at Ganesha’s Go Rewise facility features an SSP (solid state polycondensation) reactor for food-grade decontamination of the produced rPET pellets. A positive EFSA opinion for the process has been issued end of June 2022. The line has taken up production in July 2022 and has an output of up to 1,800 kg of recycled PET pellets per hour. The food-safe rPET is supplied to environment-conscious and quality-focused brands, which use it in their brand packaging.

Khandelwal describes the special challenges the company is facing with regard to food-grade applications: “Raw material quality is highly variable, especially in India. The scrap has all kinds of impurities, and every batch that enters the factory is different. It has taken us 30 years to understand and master the art of handling such waste. With the world’s best technologies, we can now achieve the quality needed for food-grade applications.”

With the new PET bottle-to-bottle recycling plant, Go Rewise ranks among the first recycled PET brands in India to provide food-grade rPET for the local and international packaging market.

According to Khandelwal, the high acceptability by brand owners was one of the reasons Ganesha opted for Starlinger technology. “Starlinger’s PET recycling technology has received several Letters of Non-Objection from the US FDA as well as positive opinions of Europe’s EFSA for food-grade applications and is already well known among brand owners. The proven Starlinger quality, equipment reliability and technology standard, as well as efficient resource consumption while delivering the best quality output were additional points”, he stated.

With both new Starlinger lines operational, the rPET production capacity of Ganesha’s Go Rewise facility currently reaches 40,000 tons per year.

Ganesha Ecosphere has a remarkable history in PET recycling”, said Paul Niedl, Commercial Head of Starlinger recycling technology. “The company’s founder Shyam Sunder Sharmma recognised the big potential that used PET bottles provide as a secondary resource at a remarkably early stage, making the company a trailblazer for bottle-to-fibre and now bottle-to-bottle applications. We feel proud to support Ganesha Ecosphere in reducing plastic waste and establishing a closed loop for PET bottle waste in India, a country with great potential in this sector.”

Ganesha Ecosphere looks back on 30 years of experience in the PET recycling business and can be considered a role model regarding sustainable business activities.

Founded in 1987, the company started out as a yarn processing facility. It was among the first companies in India to start reprocessing PET waste to manufacture recycled polyester staple fibre (RPSF) and recycled polyester spun yarns (RPSY) in 1994.

By today, the group has established a large network of over 300 scrap vendors located across the country and operates four factories in India – two in Uttar Pradesh, one in Uttarakhand, and the recently opened one in Telangana. It also recently operationalised its first factory outside India in Nepal.

With over 500 customers and exports to more than 18 countries, the company ranks among the largest rPET producers in India with 130,000 tonnes per year and currently recycles around 16 – 18 % of India’s total PET waste.

By committing earlier this year to recycle 76% of all paper consumed by 2030, the European paper value chain renewed its pledge to contribute to the EU’s transformation towards a new model of circular economy. The 2021 Monitoring Report, released today, marks the first report monitoring the paper value chain’s recycling commitment under the new European Declaration on Paper Recycling 2021–2030. The report will be later published on a yearly basis to monitor progress towards this new commitment.

In 2021, 71.4% of all paper and board consumed in Europe was recycled. Both consumption of new paper and board and collection of paper for recycling (PfR) have increased. In a year-to-year comparison, the total amount of paper and board collected and recycled in the paper sector in 2021 increased by 2%, up to 57.1 million tonnes. This is in part thanks to important new investments in paper recycling capacities in Europe.

Since 2000, the European paper value chain has been committed to improving the process and quality of recycling and to overcoming obstacles to paper recycling in Europe. To that end, the paper value chain has undertaken various initiatives to facilitate the recycling process and increase recycling rates.

Some of the activities undertaken by the paper value chain include the publication of collection and sorting guidelines and a roadmap to further increase the sustainability of packaging. Most important is also the value chain’s commitment to collection targets, including projects assessing the quality of paper for recycling and its collaboration with CEN, the European Committee for Standardisation, on technical specifications.

Also essential were initiatives to make paper-based products recyclable by design, including the publication of a Circularity by Design Guideline for fibre-based packaging, as well as information campaigns organised to support awareness and exchange best practices on recycling technologies within the industry.

Download the report

The pilot project will take place in Ho Chi Minh City until March 2023, and for the first time, the recycling activities are being run with the cooperation of beverage and food manufacturers in the PRO Vietnam alliance, and a digital solution from Circular Action, the KOLEKT App, is being used to manage carton collection.

“Promoting the collection of used beverage cartons for recycling has always been at the core of Tetra Pak’s sustainable development. By doing this, we aim to realise our promise to protect what’s good, including protecting food, protecting people and protecting the planet,” said Mr. Eliseo Barcas, Managing Director of Tetra Pak Vietnam.

The project follows on from a feasibility study BVRio conducted for Tetra Pak in 2020 looking at strategies for the collection and recycling of used beverage cartons in both Vietnam and India. The study found that informal waste pickers are crucial to carton collection programmes, and that a project design that neglects informal collectors could potentially destroy their jobs. With Circular Action’s mobile app, developed with waste pickers in Indonesia, Circular Action designed this pilot Circular Action Programme (CAP) to manage the recovery and recycling of 3,000 tonnes of used beverage cartons in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

In order to deliver social, as well as environmental, benefit, PRO Vietnam is providing additional incentives to aggregators and recyclers to process the cartons, a benefit passed onto waste pickers through higher prices paid for collected materials. In fact beverage cartons, like those made by Tetra Pak, were not automatically collected by informal waste pickers, until now.

Mr. Pham Phu Ngoc Trai, Chairman of PRO Vietnam, said: “We appreciate the initiative, the model and the effectiveness of the collection for recycling of Used Beverage Carton projects from Tetra Pak – one of our core members. Hence, we would like to collaborate to execute this pilot project with the expectation to open a new model in collection for recycling of UBC – a material that faced a lot of challenges in collection, supporting the informal sector playing in this value chain, and promoting the circular economy in Viet Nam.

“We believe that the pilot project will be successful and serve as a foundation to increase carton collection and recycling in the coming years. Besides, we will also utilise this initiative as a typical example to apply the collection for recycling of other packaging materials. This will be our flagship project, reconfirm our commitment in execution of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) – which will be effective in early 2024. PRO VN believes, together, we will make our Viet Nam Green – Clean – Beautiful.”

A Circular Action Programme (CAP) is a customised service based on engaging all actors in the waste supply chain and providing incentives for collection, sorting and recycling of waste materials. The system is managed using supply chain traceability and monitoring tools (the KOLEKT app and reporting platforms) for the program to register all actors participating in waste management supply chains to enable the traceability of waste along the supply chain.

The programme will start by paying larger waste collection centres an incentive fee for all tonnes of Tetra Pak Cartons sold to paper recycler Dong Tien Paper, to be recycled into brown paper and into chipboard or corrugated roofing. The large collection centres (or waste aggregators) receiving a performance based payment per Kg sold, will pass on the bonus to waste pickers in order to secure supply. Tetra Pak cartons are usually not collected at all, and so this new recycling opportunity is providing vital additional income for the waste pickers.

The project is being overseen by the new Circular Action team in Vietnam by Project Manager, John Murphy, and Project Coordinator, Tran Ngoc Tran, and by Circular Action Director, Thierry Sanders, based in the Netherlands.

Thierry Sanders, Circular Action, Director: “This project has the potential to be transformational for all involved. This project brings a triple-dividend of firstly preventing waste going to landfills or nature; then it increases the incomes of waste pickers and finally creates cooperation throughout the supply chain. Tetra Pak is the perfect partner willing to pilot this innovative way of working, involving mobile technology. PRO Vietnam now has the method to grow waste collection across Vietnam for the decades to come.”

2020 was an unprecedented year as the COVID crisis impacted markets, industries and lifestyles around the world. But despite these many upheavals, recovered fiber succeeded in building upon its pivotal role in global paper and board production.

Whereas paper and board production fell 3.4% worldwide in 2020, production of recovered paper declined by a significantly smaller 1.6% to a shade under 240 million tonnes. And of all the paper and board produced in that pandemic-hit year, 52.2% used recovered fibers compared to 51.2% in the previous year, it is revealed in “Paper and board recycling in 2020: Overview of world statistics”.

As with its predecessors, this third edition of the BIR Paper Division’s annual analysis of key recovered fiber data has been compiled with the assistance of the European Recycling Industries’ Confederation (Euric). Additional to data input from RISI and CEPI, BIR’s divisional experts have used their own insight and reasoned calculations to quantify the fundamental role of recycled fiber as an environmentally-beneficial component of global paper and board production.

“Even during a global pandemic, the recovered paper industry continued to play its essential role in supplying the world paper and board industry with specification raw material,” observes BIR Paper Division President Francisco Donoso of Spain-based Dolaf Servicios Verdes in his introduction to the new report.

Asia incorporated more than 71% of recycled content into its paper and board production in 2020 owing to its leading role as a cardboard producer. Europe achieved an incorporation rate average of more than 56% while the numbers for the USA/Canada and for Latin America were, respectively, 40% and 67%.

As regards international trade in recovered paper, the report’s stand-out statistics include a further slump in China’s imports from around 11 million tonnes in 2019 to little more than 7 million tonnes the following year, well over half of which was provided by the USA. Having been the pre-eminent overseas market for Europe’s recovered fibre exports for many years, China slipped to fifth place in 2020 behind India, Indonesia, Turkey and Vietnam owing to its tightened import controls.

Recovered paper usage “will not achieve its full potential” and the economics of paper and board recycling will be “seriously compromised” without free international trade, the report contends. Pointing in particular to the European Commission’s push for severe limitations on exports of recovered fiber beyond the EU, Mr Donoso adds: “Without the pressure valve of international exports to cope with major surpluses within Europe, the future for the recovered paper industry will look very bleak indeed.”

“Paper and board recycling in 2020: Overview of world statistics” provides data on recovered fiber production, its incorporation into new products and its main trade flows, while also highlighting key paper/board and pulp developments.

“A price drop of as much as 25 percent, combined with other factors, creates a new reality for the paper industry,” explains Yasser Ismail, RCP expert at Geminor.

Paper production and the re-use of paper for recycling is a huge business in Europe. According to CEPI, the total pulp and paper turnover reached €95 billion in 2021, an increase of €13 billion from 2020. Paper and board production last year ended at 90,6 million tonnes in Europe, with a production capacity rate of just over 90 percent. Also, the first half of 2022 has shown industry growth – and what until recently seemed to be a full COVID recovery for the big players of the business.

Sudden market change

But by the end of July, we are seeing a radical change. “The signs of a back-bouncing market were present back in May, but were not expected before Q4”, explains Yasser Ismail.

“Some of the world’s largest packaging producers located throughout Europe are reporting a decrease in their recovered paper demand. This is because the market for packaging goods is under pressure and starting to tumble. Each of the German packaging mills announced for August a RCP reduction of 20 000 to 50 000 tonnes, or close to 15 percent down from normal offtake. In addition, several paper mills have brought forward or extended their necessary inspection and shutdown periods”, says Ismail.

An extraordinary situation

Ismail has over 23 years of experience in the pulp and paper industry. He has not seen a quicker change in the packaging market since the crises of 2008.

“The European economy is facing an extraordinary situation with inflation running wild, a war in Ukraine, and prolonged shipping capacity issues. Naturally, this also affects the paper industry, and two factors in particular are creating these sudden challenges: A dramatic fall in general consumption, and a tripling of energy prices”, says Ismail.

At the moment, both recovered and new paper stocks are full to the brim. This has a profound effect on the current RCP market prices.

“Market price-related contracts for mixed paper (CEPI-Grade Code 1.01/1.02) and OCC (CEPI-Grade Code 1.04/ 1.05 and 4.03 Old Corrugated Carton) fractions have recently fallen by 30 to 80 EUR per ton, or close to 25 percent from July to August”, says Ismail.

Affected by gas prices

A high percentage of the collected recovered paper is re-used in the packaging industry, which makes it sensitive to economic fluctuations. The decrease in the production of precursor products for the automotive and aerospace industries alone is resulting in a reduction in packaging production of as much as 17 percent.

In addition, the cost of producing paper products, which mostly depends on gas and electricity prices, is reaching a level where profits are fading away.

“There has been a public debate since April regarding the possibility of gas triage to provide heat for private households over the winter. This has led to general uncertainty for many businesses, also in Germany. Some mills are reporting that in the event of a government rationing or allocation of gas, production could be cut by 50 percent. This will affect all parts of the value chain. As a consequence of this it could become a challenge to find off-takers for un-contracted bulk grade quantities, which are day-traded on best-price level”, says Ismail.

Shipping issues

Normally, the export of recovered paper could help balance the European market. Out of the 50,1 million tonnes of recovered paper for recycling utilized in 2021, more than 6,9 million tonnes were exported out of Europe. This export is also facing challenges, as Asia is currently “silent,” explains Ismail.

“There are reports of container equipment challenges for the East-Bound traffic to Asia, which makes it difficult to export RCP. This and other factors temporarily lead to the reduction of export of packaging papers and the increase in quantities within Europe.”

A predictable market

Falling or rising recovered paper prices are not necessarily a problem, but the market players in all parts of the value chain need to adapt to a new reality, argues Yasser Ismail.

“With the prices advertised in July and August, we have reached an unprecedented all-time high in several RCP grades. The problem associated with this is basically that sales are inflated, fiscal liquidity increases diametrically and the financial default risk increases for each individual load on the customer side. This may be a new breaking point in this industry. Most likely we will see more frequent fluctuations in the RCP markets in the future, with varying volumes, production capacity, demand, and prices.”

“Paper recycling is an important part of a sustainable Europe, but to develop a well-functioning circular economy, we need a more stable and predictable market.”

“The European average recycling rate has fallen slightly, and to get it back on track we must ensure that recovered paper continues to be an attractive commodity”, concludes Ismail.

Located in Skedsmokorset, near Oslo, the facility collects and sorts waste from seven surrounding municipalities. Until seven years ago, plastics, paper, cardboard, and residual waste were collected separately curbside. A lot of recyclables still ended up in the household waste fraction and were thus deemed to be burnt. Tomra and ROAF examined the household waste composition. They developed a business plan to roll out a new waste disposal strategy for the seven municipalities that ROAF serves.

The new approach includes a change in the region’s waste management and collection practices. The municipalities ROAF serves abolished the separate collection of plastics. They now follow a 3-container waste collection system. Inhabitants dispose of biowaste in green bags. They throw it together with plastics and residues in the municipal solid waste container. The container is collected by a ROAF truck and transported to the sorting center. A second container gathers paper and cardboard. The third one collects glass and metal packaging. The second part of the new business model was the construction of the world’s first fully automated sorting plant for MSW. After a 3-year period of planning, Stadler constructed the plant in 3 months. The trommels, bag openers, ballistic separators, eddy current separators, overhead magnets, and vibratory screens work in unison with the optical sorters from Tomra. Sixteen Autosorts process 40 tons of waste per hour. In the sorting process, the units recover biowaste, paper, and plastics from this waste.

In the facility, at first three of Tomra’s Autosort systems separate green bags from the remaining waste. The green bags are sent to a biogas site. There, the organics are converted into biogas for refueling the plant’s collection trucks and bio-fertilizers. The remaining waste bags undergo further sorting steps. Different drum screens separate the materials by size before ballistic separators and 16 Autosorts undertake a much more precise differentiation by material type. Five different types of plastics, as well as paper, can be separated from the infeed material. In the last step, magnets and eddy-current separators remove metallic fractions. All individual fractions generated are stored in bunkers and sold to European processors. In 2014, sorting targets were set at 2,500 tons of plastics and 6,000 tons of organics per year. The capacity in 2021 reaches 3.600 tons for plastics and 11,500 tons for biowaste. Since the automation of the plant in 2014, manual sorting efforts are no longer required. ROAF aims to reach reuse and recycling rates of 70% by 2030.

A peer-reviewed study shows that reusable packaging has a stronger impact on climate than recyclable corrugated.

EU policies place a strong emphasis on the role of packaging in the circular economy and its design to be recycled and/or reused. Packaging exists for a reason; therefore, it is vital to consider packaging functionality, sustainability, and overall performance from a life-cycle perspective.

The three studies released by FEFCO were conducted by an independent consultancy (Ramboll) and a research institute (VTT). The studies evaluate the impact of recyclable corrugated board packaging compared to reusable plastic packaging and revealed a series of important conclusions.

The peer-reviewed comparative life-cycle assessment compares the environmental impact of corrugated cardboard boxes and plastic crates when transporting produce over average distances in Europe. Key findings, extracted by FEFCO, show that:

• The corrugated board system is more beneficial in 10 out of 15 impact categories, including climate change, total resource use including fossils, mineral and metals.
• The break-even analysis shows that plastic crates would need to reach a minimum of 63 rotations to outperform corrugated boxes in the climate change impact category. According to the Life Cycle Analysis (LCA), the average reuse rate of plastic reusable crates is 24 rotations which is below the break-even.

The hot spot analysis of the e-commerce logistic chain evaluates recyclable corrugated versus reusable plastic solutions. The study identified 51 hot spots, or stages in the life cycle, which account for a significant proportion of the environmental impact of the packaging within the supply chain. The top 3 hot spots, summarised by FEFCO are:

• Real number of uses for multiple use solutions is the most important parameter, as official EU data does not exist, and available data is not always transparent.
• Logistics parameters (e.g. storage, transport distances, loading capacity, sorting) are ranked second, indicating the transport distances have a major impact notably on emissions and will continue to influence the life cycle of the product.
• Percentage of recycled material used in production is another key point as the data for recycled content of reusable packaging is limited. On the contrary, it is well-established that corrugated cardboard packaging contains on average 89% recycled content.

The white paper, prepared by research institute, VTT, provides a critical view on packaging recycling and reuse in the European Circular Economy. The study conclusions, summarised by FEFCO, are as follows:

• The concept of ‘fit for purpose’ packaging should be central in the Commission’s proposal of the Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive (PPWD) as it contributes to achieving circularity and climate neutrality while reducing waste.
• Both recyclable corrugated and reusable packaging solutions could provide appropriate solutions depending on the packaging requirements and should be considered by the European Commission when proposing legislation.
• The waste hierarchy should be improved based on life cycle thinking, as reusable packaging is not always the most sustainable solution.
• Environmental impacts may simply shift, not disappear, as a result of scaling up reuse systems.
• There is no obvious best choice when selecting between recyclable and reusable packaging solutions as results vary significantly on a case-by-case basis. This demonstrates a clear need to avoid one-size-fits-all policy and rather focus on fit-for-purpose solutions.
• The shift to reusable systems involves substantial initial economic investments thus creating new costs related to washing, repair etc. while burdening the environment, with no guarantee of success.

Eleni Despotou, Director General of FEFCO, said “Based on evidence, it is critical to consider that expressing a clear preference for reusable versus recyclable packaging is a narrow-minded approach. Legislative proposals must ensure that any packaging placed on the EU market is ‘fit for purpose,’ environmentally friendly, fulfils its functionality and prevents unnecessary waste which is the ultimate objective of policymakers.”

A well-functioning circular economy requires efficient and environmentally friendly circulation of materials where both reuse and recycled packaging have their role to play.
However, a robust understanding of their impacts is needed. Therefore, policies must encourage sustainable packaging solutions that truly contribute to waste prevention. Using a blend of properly deployed lifecycle assessments will prevent unintended consequences for our environment and climate while allowing business to innovate and meet their commitments.

For the first time since 2019, the annual meeting of the Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) was held again from May 23 to 25, 2022 – this time in Barcelona. In addition to the opportunity to engage with 1,300 participants, the event focused on the European Commission’s plans for waste shipment regulation. In its proposal, the Commission argues that if waste is exported, it could “pose risks to human health and the environment, especially if the waste is not properly controlled”. However, BIR criticizes the EU as being more concerned with the “positive economic value” of this waste as stated in the proposal. Regarding steel scrap, BIR Director General Arnaud Brunet expressed that for the EU to remain within the Union is desired “so that steel mills can decarbonize for a good price.” Ross Bartley, BIR director of trade and environment, called this intention protectionism.

Dare more lobbying

BIR representatives were self-critical of the need to do more to represent the interests of the recycling industry in Brussels. “We’ve got to keep beating the drum,” BIR President Tom Bird said in Barcelona.

Other challenges currently facing member companies in the various BIR divisions and the industry as a whole included Russia’s war against Ukraine, rising energy and transportation prices, restrictions on trade due to Shanghai lockdowns, and labor shortages felt around the world, including as a result of the Corona pandemic.

In discussions with guest speaker Jack Farchy, author of the book “The World for Sale,” and Robin Martin, head of market development at the London Metal Exchange (LME), BIR representatives also discussed possible backgrounds to the sudden surge in nickel prices on the LME in March 2022 and how such events can be prevented in the future.

In 2020, Europe has collected on average 54.4 million tons of recovered paper and used 47.9 million tons internally. However, there is a lasting gap between supply and demand of around 7 million tons in terms of excess supply of recovered paper in Europe as observed over the past years. In the absence of end markets for around 7 million tons of recovered paper in Europe, exports are vitally important for the European paper recycling industry.

“The future Waste Shipment Regulation should not hamper a well-functioning global market for the trade of recovered paper’’ says Hans van de Nes, President of ERPA, the Recovered Paper Branch of EuRIC. ‘’We understand the need to restrict exports of ‘problematic waste streams’ as identified in the new Circular Economy Action Plan to countries lacking a proper infrastructure. However, exports of recovered paper meeting EN 643 to countries outside of the European Union are absolutely crucial for the paper recycling industry. While the majority of waste paper collected and recovered in the EU stays in the EU to make new paper in circular value chains, recovered paper remains a raw materials from recycling with a global supply and demand that can easily be used as a substitute or in complement of virgin pulp by paper mills to produce new paper.’’

The proposal to revise the Waste Shipment Regulation (WSR) completely ignores the major differences between the various waste streams. The one-size-fits all approach subjecting all waste streams to similar export restrictions without making any distinction between untreated wastes and recovered paper meeting the European standard EN643 will result in lasting negative impacts for the EU’s recycling industry. When restricting access to global end-markets, costs for collection and processing will no longer be covered by revenues of the recovered paper sales which will lead to the need of financial contributions by municipalities to be able to continue a proper separate collection.

ERPA unconditionally supports the transition towards a more circular economy – using recovered paper compared to primary materials for the production of new paper saves more than 60% of energy and is inherently resource and climate-efficient. However, in the absence of sufficient production capacity in the Europe, global trade with recovered paper remains crucial as recovered paper can only be stocked for a very limited time and needs to be rapidly used in a paper mill to produce new paper. ERPA strongly welcomes the additional capacities that are announced by the European paper industry to increase the demand in Europe. “However, building new capacities will take time and won’t be sufficient to close the gap between supply and demand’’ van de Nes concluded.

Since it stopped the separate collection for plastics in its region and unleashed the power of mixed waste sorting, the facility increased recovery rates from 28% to 82% and achieved recycling rates of 56,4%, thus meeting the EU’s 2025 recycling targets ahead of time. Today, Ivar ranks first in processing MSW by volume.

Situated in Forus, between the cities of Stavanger and Sandnes in the southwest of Norway, IVAR manages all residues and waste collection from 10 municipalities with an approximate population of 325.000. With its advanced municipal solid waste sorting plant, it recovers high volumes of recyclable materials before incineration, reducing CO2 emissions and the global dependency on virgin material by supplying high-quality recycled content for new products and packaging.

When local and international recycling targets became increasingly stringent, IVAR recognized the need to improve its waste management methods and decided to more closely examine the hidden potential of its region’s household waste. With the goal of finding the most effective and environmentally friendly approach to waste management, the company sought the advice of TOMRA. To identify the opportunities in mixed waste sorting and assess its performance potential, the plant sent MSW samples from the region to Tomra’s test facility in Germany. There, these materials underwent extensive tests on the company’s sorting machines. Test analysis showed that, whereas paper recovery from MSW streams performed reasonably well, plastics recovery offered room for improvement. Test analysis unveiled that the household waste contained high amounts of plastic recyclables, even though they were meant to be disposed of separately. The team considered the analysis as a clear call for concrete, future-oriented action.

Based on the analysis and the still untouched possibilities in MSW sorting, a new business case was developed. The result: the construction of a new fully automated mixed waste sorting plant consisting of new facilities for plastics reprocessing and paper sorting, as well as the elimination of the separate plastics collection in that region. Previously collected separately, plastics are now also disposed of in the grey bin and recovered in the new facility. As a consequence, only the plant’s residues are transported to the waste to energy plant and used for the production of electricity and energy for remote heating systems. In short, the materials discarded by the municipality are turned into value again in the most optimal way.

In late 2014, the plant building project began with Sutco Recycling Technik chosen as a plant supplier for IVAR’s combined residual waste and paper sorting plant. Sutco, in turn, selected TOMRA Recycling as project partner for sorting equipment. Since the new facility started operation in January 2019, 22 of TOMRA’s state-of-the-art AUTOSORT® sorting units efficiently and effectively sort plastics (PET, PS, LDPE, HDPE, PP) and paper (mixed paper, cardboard, beverage cartons) out of the residual waste (grey bins) collected curbside. In addition, metals (aluminum, steel) are recovered from the residual waste.

Today, Ivar processes 40 tons of MSW per hour from which paper, plastics, metals, and residues are separated in numerous steps:

Presorting
Once the collected material is fed into the plant, items > 350mm are sorted by a finger screen and shredded into smaller pieces before two drum screens separate the material into three target sizes: 0-60mm; 60-150mm; and 150-320mm. In a second step, Tomra’s Autosort machines recover 90% of the mid-sized (60-150 mm) and the large (150-320 mm) plastic fractions before they extract mixed paper. Finally, magnets and eddy currents remove both the non-ferrous and ferrous metals.

Plastics and paper recovery
After plastics have been presorted, they are further sorted by material type. First, ballistic separators separate plastic film and rigid plastics. Afterwards, 14 Autosort machines undertake the separation of rigid plastics into PP, HDPE, PS, PET and create a clean fraction of LDPE plastic film. To further increase purity levels, these clean material fractions undergo a second sorting step, also carried out by Autosort machines, to remove the remaining contaminants. The high-quality PS and PET end fractions are then packed into material-type-specific bales and sent to different mechanical recycling plants in Europe. LDPE, HDPE and PP are washed, dried and pelletized in the Forus plant and sold as pellets.

At the same time, the mixed paper fraction, as well as mixed paper and cardboard infeed coming from separate collection, is processed in a separate sorting line. From the 23,250 metric tons of paper sorted per shift, 95,7% of the infeed material is turned into four salable paper products such De-ink, ECC (corrugated cardboard), tetra Pak and carton.

When Tomra was selected as technology provider of IVAR’s waste sorting plant, it was clear that the most advanced sensor-based sorting technology was required. Specifically, Tomra provided 22 of its Autosort machines to extract both paper and plastics from household waste.

Equipped with sophisticated infrared sorting technology, which combines near infrared (NIR) and visual spectrometer (VIS), the machine can accurately and quickly identify and separate different materials according to their material type and color. In Forus, Autosort machines sort paper into three and plastics into six target fractions. Its sorting accuracy is mainly based on the integrated Flying Beam technology, which evenly distributes light across the entire conveyer belt and scans and analyzes all material passing through the scanner. The sensor sends the respective signal to the machine’s valve blocks which turn the scanner’s information into action, either ejecting or dropping scanned items.

When starting operations in 2019, Ivar set an overall goal to recover nearly all plastic types (PE, PP, PS, PET) and a more concrete target to realize purity rates of 95-96% in LDPE, PP, HDPE, PS and PET sorting. Thanks to the ultraprecise sorting machines, the plant’s goal soon became reality, with purity rates of up to 98% achieved. As for paper, sorting studies have shown that more than 85% of all beverage cartons in the residual household waste have been successfully separated from the household waste stream.

After extraction of recyclables from the infeed material, the sorted fractions undergo an extensive recycling process on-site. Whereas homogenous PET and PS bales as well as both ferrous and non-ferrous metals are sold to European recyclers, Polyolefins (LDPE, HDPE, and PP) are shredded into flakes, hot washed, dried and pelletized on-site before these are sold as industrial commodities. Thousands of tons of PE and PP recovered from MSW have been diverted from incineration and to be integrated in the production of high-quality PO recyclates.

The business case at Ivar proves that sorting prior to disposal can preserve recyclable materials previously incinerated and strongly contribute to climate protection. Prior to opening the waste sorting plant, the separate collection rate in the region served by Ivar was high: 65% of the waste collected in the municipalities was sorted. However, with the plant fully operational, the recovery rates of recyclables are now as high as 74%.

From an environmental perspective, sorting, recovering, and recycling plastics from mixed waste streams – instead of relying solely on material-dedicated collection systems – leads to a two-fold reduction in CO2 emissions. First, less plastics, that comes with a high caloric value but based on fossil carbon, are incinerated. Second, the provision of high-quality recycled plastics reduces the need for primary production. Thus, IVAR contributes to delivering environment-friendly feed and works in line with the principles of a circular economy, resulting in a decrease of 33,000 metric tons of CO2 emissions a year, which is equivalent to taking 20,000 fossil fuel cars off the road.

The results have clearly shown that MSW sorting before incineration brings numerous benefits: in Norway, the need for separate collection of plastics packaging, and its associated costs, has been eliminated and enabled Ivar to provide ready-for-market recycled material for new products and packaging, while reducing its CO2 footprint considerably. Furthermore, the partners have already started to investigate if glass and biowaste could be profitably extracted from the fines fraction (0-60 mm).

Automating the sorting process with the latest technology has strongly contributed to this change. However, the partners are convinced that automation only complements waste sorting but will never replace local separate waste collection systems. Rather, the components of optimal waste management must go hand in hand – from collection to mixed waste sorting to recycling – to have the biggest impact on how much we recycle. In Norway, we see that it works.

“By reducing our use of fossil fuels by shifting to renewable energy, Kirkniemi Mill is increasingly part of the solution to climate change. As the upcoming UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) negotiations will underpin, we collectively need to scale up climate action, and such investments are critical to change our emissions trajectory and dependency on fossil fuels”, explains Mill Director Martti Savelainen.

The project, set for completion in early 2023, will contribute significantly to Sappi Europe’s decarbonisation roadmap by exiting coal at one of its last facilities partially using this fuel type. Biomass will then be used in Kirkniemi’s multi-fuel boiler, built in 2015. The move advances Sappi towards its 2025 targets which include reducing specific greenhouse gas emissions (scope 1 and 2) by 25 percent and increasing renewable energy share to 50 percent in Europe compared to 2019.

The investment will establish the equipment needed to receive, store and handle woody biomass like the bark, sawdust and wood chips used for biofuel production. Such biomass types are by-products from the forest-based industry and utilising them for energy production derives further value from the forest resource.

In addition to increasing share of renewable energy, Sappi’s mills are also focused on reducing energy consumption. Sappi Kirkniemi Mill is party to Finland’s National Energy Efficiency Agreement and consistently reaches their energy saving targets. Kirkniemi’s ISO 50001 certification provides further evidence of the mill’s systematic improvement in energy efficiency.

Mr Donoso is Managing Director at ALBA Servicios Verdes (Spain), a long-standing member of BIR, and has been active on the Paper divisional board since 2008. He is also Vice-President of the Spanish BIR member association REPACAR and board member of the ‘Union de Empresas de Recuperacion’. He holds a degree in biological sciences and a Master in Business Administration.

Mr Donoso’s appointment was recommended to the divisional board by the Division’s Nominating Committee. In his capacity as Paper Division President, Mr Donoso is a member of the BIR Executive Committee and serves as Vice-President of the organization.

BIR President Tom Bird commented on Mr Donoso’s appointment: “Francisco has not only a deep knowledge of the paper recycling industry but also of the important associative work provided by BIR’s Paper Division. I am sure that under his leadership, the Division will grow and diversify in order to reflect the global importance of the recovered paper industry. I am very much looking forward to working with him within the BIR Executive Committee.”

Mr Bird also thanked Mr Jean-Luc Petithuguenin of Paprec Recyclage for his excellent services as President of the BIR Paper Division during his two mandates and for his continuous support to BIR in the past difficult period.

Updated data for the study from September 2021 clearly reconfirms the benefits of single-use paper-based packaging compared to multi-use systems.

EPPA and its members are committed to the objectives of the European Green Deal and support science-based EU policies. At a time in which the European Union is working to make its economy truly circular, it is essential to rely on evidence-based solutions.

That is why EPPA asked Ramboll, independent Danish consultants to the European Commission, to carry out a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) study to obtain a comprehensive picture of the overall environmental performance of food and drink containers used in European quick-service restaurants throughout the whole life cycle of these items. The study was also independently assessed by Germany’s TÜV (Technischer Überwachungsverein) and meets ISO standards.

The LCA study by Ramboll relies on primary data from the paper, packaging and foodservice industries to compare the overall environmental performance of both disposable and reusable food and drink containers used in a quick-service restaurant for in-store consumption.

Comparing the overall impacts on the environment of an item means accounting for all the factors involved in its life cycle. While it may at first seem intuitive that multi-use systems have a lower environmental impact, as these items can be used more than once, it is also easy to forget about some important factors that can result in larger negative environmental impacts – above all the impact coming from washing and drying these items.

Accounting for the energy consumption involved in the use phase of reusable plastic and traditional crockery, during in-store or out-sourced washing and drying, the Ramboll LCA study shows that the environmental impact of these multi-use systems significantly outweigh the impact of single-use paper food packaging.

Using substantially less energy throughout their lifecycle, single-use systems result in “very significant” environmental advantages in 6 out of 9 of the relevant environmental categories. The updated report reveals that reusable tableware generates 2.8 times more CO2-equivalent emissions than the paper-based single-use system, consumes 3.4 times more freshwater, produces 2.2 times more fine particulate matter, increases fossil and metal resource depletion by 3.4 times, and increases terrestrial acidification by 1.7 times.

In the greater perspective, if the studied multi-use system was introduced across Europe, its environmental impact would be equivalent to adding an annual extra 1 million petrol cars on Europe’s roads and would equal the freshwater needs of a city of 750,000 people. Considering that water stress and scarcity is an increasingly frequent phenomenon in Europe and that carbon emissions must be dramatically reduced, the urgency of choosing the more environmentally friendly option is clear.

Single-use paper-based food packaging further differentiates itself at the end of its life cycle. Contrary to polypropylene or traditional glass, metal and ceramic multi-use systems, single-use paper-based items are fully recyclable. Recycling these items is key, since the relative advantages of single-use packaging increase substantially as the recycling rate in restaurants increase from the 30% baseline of the Ramboll study. In freshwater usage alone, increasing the recycling rate of the paper-based items to 70% raises the advantage of the paper items from 3.4 to 228 times better.

The approval means that Valmet’s climate targets support the Paris Climate Agreement’s goal to limit global warming to 1.5°C and are based on the latest climate science.
In its climate program Valmet is targeting to reduce CO₂ emissions from its own operations by 80 percent and 20 percent in its supply chain by 2030. Valmet also targets to enable carbon neutral production for all its pulp and paper industry customers by 2030 by developing new technologies. Valmet is also improving the energy efficiency of its current technology offering by 20 percent. The baseline year for the CO₂ reduction targets is 2019.

“Valmet believes that technology plays a key role in mitigating climate change and global warming and the transition to a carbon neutral economy. We are happy that the Science Based Targets initiative has approved our climate program targets as contributing to the limiting of global warming to the targeted 1.5oC level. With concrete actions we will significantly reduce our own and customers’ carbon footprint and support our suppliers to do the same. Valmet is strongly committed to be the preferred partner for our customers on their journey to carbon neutrality,” says Pasi Laine, President and CEO, Valmet.

This is one of many key findings in “Paper and board recycling in 2019: Overview of world statistics”, the second edition of the BIR Paper Division’s revamped analysis of global statistics relating to the recovered fibre industry. The report explores not only production and utilization of recovered fibre but also major international trade flows, as well as key pulp and paper/board market information.

Based on data compiled with the assistance of the European Recycling Industries’ Confederation (EuRIC), RISI and CEPI, experts within the BIR Paper Division also make a number of reasoned calculations to quantify the fundamental role of recycled fibre as an environmentally beneficial component of global paper and board production.

“2019 brought an increase in the proportion of the world’s paper and board that was made from recovered fibre – from 50.27% in 2018 to 51.15% the following year,” points out Jean-Luc Petithuguenin, President of BIR’s Paper Division and CEO of France-based Paprec, in his introduction to the new publication.

Asia produced almost half of all the paper and board using recovered fibres, not least because of its leading role as a cardboard producer, while Europe achieved a recovered fibre incorporation rate average of almost 55%.

Despite its increasingly stringent import restrictions, China remained the world’s leading recovered fibre importer in 2019. Of particular note, Europe shipped more recovered fibre to India in 2019 than it did to China – a development that “none of us would have anticipated only a handful of years ago”, according to Mr Petithuguenin.

The 2019 data also underline significant emerging outlets for recovered fibre, notably Vietnam, as well as the continued strong market presence of other, more established buyers in Asia such as India and Indonesia, Mr Petithuguenin adds.

Andritz’s scope of supply includes a compete reject handling line that processes rejects from the mill’s two OCC lines and the pulp drying line on site and has a design capacity of 400 t/d.

The innovative reject line delivered and started up by Andritz comprises the following key equipment:

• Reject Compactor ReCo for dewatering the light rejects from coarse and drum screening to highest dryness
• ADuro P shredder equipped with a unique knife system and a robust rotor to ensure that the material is cut to the required particle sizes in only one step
• ADuro C shredder with special coupled shafts to facilitate knife exchange during maintenance and thus reduce downtime

In addition, Andritz installed approach flow systems and broke handling as well as several stock preparation components as part of two OCC lines. The stock preparation systems feed two paper production lines that feature a maximum capacity of 1,434 t/d each and produce high-quality test liner and corrugated paper as their final product.