Expanding the market

Cascades, a Kingsey Falls, Quebec-based paper and packaging company, selected Finnish equipment and technology company Valmet as its partner for a strategic market expansion project in the southeastern U.S. as it acquired and prepared to convert an old newsprint machine to produce lightweight, high-quality, 100 percent-recycled linerboard and corrugated medium for the North American market.

Recycled linerboard and corrugated medium have been Cascades’ core business. Luc Pelletier, vice president of operations and packaging at Cascades, highlights the company’s efforts in North America, being among the first to produce recycled medium in linerboard. This strategy has been in place for 60 years, and Cascades’ newest mill—the Bear Island recycled containerboard mill in Ashland, Virginia—is a direct extension of the company’s commitment to maintain a strong U.S. base focused on producing lower basis weight in recycled medium and linerboard.

Cascades acquired the White Birch Bear Island paper mill in 2018, a deal worth $34.2 million, and revealed in October 2020 its plans to convert the newsprint machine to produce recycled linerboard and medium. According to Cascades, the Bear Island project represents the largest investment in the company’s 60-year history, with the entire conversion project amounting to about $525 million.

Cascades considered several factors when acquiring the mill, including that the trim and geographical location were ideal for supporting the company’s U.S. expansion in the Southeast. The mill’s status as a brownfield site also presented an opportunity to rehire former employees, a fact Mathieu Gendron, plant manager at Cascades Containerboard Packaging–Bear Island, emphasizes because of the availability of a high-quality workforce.

Although the location checked many boxes, the conversion was a significant undertaking, requiring a reliable industry partner. Pelletier says Cascades chose Valmet for this transformation because of its expertise with similar projects while also being the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) for the existing Beloit machine, which was delivered to the mill in the 1970s.

Key technologies help double capacity

Gendron says Cascades’ decision to work with Valmet was influenced by the equipment and technology provider’s track record of modifying existing equipment with new technology, ensuring the success of such a large conversion in terms of capital and physical size. The Bear Island mill covers 466,000 square feet.

Additionally, technological upgrades were required to double the mill’s capacity. Valmet collaborated with Cascades to add a new headbox, enhance the forming section and the press section, expand the drying section, install a size press, upgrade the old reel and add a new winder at the end of the production line.

When discussing specific technologies included in the machine line, David Lavoie, production manager of PM 1 at the Bear Island site, says the Valmet Stock Mixing MD is ideal for achieving stable mixing and consistency in the approach flow system.

“I’ve been satisfied with the mixing,” Lavoie says. “The typical machine has a mixing tank, and we were able to put that in a pipe and avoid building or constructing a tank to do the mixing.

“We have very good and consistent profile and a good dry weight profile, which is all we are asking for on the lightweight linerboard machine. We have really been pleased with that.”

He also highlights the OptiFlo Gap headbox, which he describes as “reliable,” adding, “The actuators and everything that controls the profile have been good. The headbox is in a tough zone where it is exposed to a lot of water, so sometimes it can be hard to maintain, but so far so good.”

The OptiSizer Film sizer also plays a key role in improving the strength of the paper and, according to Lavoie, is where the mill gets much of its strength, particularly with lightweight paper.

He also highlights the supply system, saying, “I like this screening system with two screens. I came from a machine that only had one instead of two pressure screen feedings. It provides better options if there’s some housekeeping that needs to be done on one screen [and] helps the uptime of the machine, so that is a very nice upgrade.

“[Another] upgrade is the size kitchen heat recovery, which I think is awesome for low energy consumption purposes. That’s a very interesting design, and it has been running well.”

The machine line also includes a Valmet Starch Cooking ZE system that features a zero-effluent solution that, Valmet says, diminishes the carbon footprint of the starch cooking process while improving the operational reliability, efficiency and process quality. It offers fully continuous operation, even when the mill experiences normal production stops—a feature not available with the previous system.

“The new starch cooking system has been running without any consumption at the paper machine,” Lavoie says. “We can actually keep the system running and, in a small switch, we can turn back to cooking.”

At the end of the machine line is a new OptiWin Drum two-drum base winder, which Valmet says has met all the set requirements and targets from a safety and capacity point of view, and Lavoie says the integrated safety features and automatic tail threading have been the main benefits of this technology.

Cascades also uses remote expert support from the Valmet Performance Center and other Valmet Industrial Internet solutions, such as advanced monitoring and prediction applications, to optimize performance with data and intelligent software for machine ramp-up optimization and operator support.

Lavoie highlights the benefits of this remote support, which allows the Valmet team to access the distributed control system to see what the operators are seeing, enabling continuous support.

The dashboards from Valmet’s self-service analytics tools also have provided operators with charts to ensure they are operating within optimal zones, while the Paper Machine Clothing Monitor tool has helped compare fabrics and manage inventory throughout the startup phase.

A successful startup

The PM 1 at Bear Island officially began operating in May 2023.

Gendron says the startup phase went “exceptionally well,” with the machine producing good-quality paper within two weeks. The mill started by producing corrugated medium, then linerboard.

The mill consumes an average of 31,000 tons of recycled feedstock per month and, when fully ramped up, is expected to produce 465,000 short tons of recycled containerboard at basis weights as low as 18 pounds, Cascades says.

Achieving high compression strength is crucial to prevent boxes from being crushed, and Pelletier emphasizes the importance of meeting stringent strength targets for medium and linerboard, noting that Cascades’ business essentially revolves around selling strength to its customers. Within two weeks, quality targets for corrugated medium were met and, shortly after, the mill achieved its targets for linerboard.

To remain competitive, Pelletier stresses the need to produce top-quality products that meet strength property targets. However, he says the ultimate test is how the sheets perform in customers’ facilities, especially with increasing investments in high-speed corrugators. As these machines operate faster, they require a stable product to ensure smooth unwinding. Therefore, reliability and stability in end products are paramount to meeting customers’ speed targets on the corrugators.

Cascades notes the site also is strategically located for raw material sourcing and logistics. The supply for the mill mostly is sourced from Virginia and the surrounding states.

“The [mill] is strategically located near Richmond, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., with very good rail and road access and easy accessibility for recycled fiber sourcing,” Cascades says. “[O]ur two ... machines in the Greenpac [Niagara Falls, New York] and Bear Island mills are positioned within the first quartile of the North American industry, optimizing our business ... both in terms of cost base and machine width, positioning it more competitively through economic downturns.”

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The mill produces a new line of Cascades XP linerboard that provides a range of lighter-weight grades, between 18-36 pounds, to complement Cascades’ line of regular and heavyweight grades. The company says the sustainability of the products meets a “growing demand for ecofriendly solutions” and increases its recycled paper capacity to more than 85 percent of its total production.

Sustainability at the core

Cascades was founded in 1964 on the simple idea of creating something new out of something old—using recycled materials to manufacture its products, making it one of the first companies in the North American pulp and paper industry to make the circular economy its business model.

The company calls the Bear Island startup a “historic milestone” in the strategic modernization of its containerboard manufacturing network and says it allows Cascades to pursue long-term growth in packaging and enhance its portfolio of sustainable packaging solutions for its North American customers.

Overall, Cascades says its Bear Island mill “is totally in line with [its] high standards of sustainability.”

“Cascades has been in this business of recycled containerboard for 60 years,” Pelletier says. “This is a value we have, to be sustainable in whatever we do.”

“When the Bear Island mill started up, only a couple months were necessary to reach our water consumption target,” Cascades adds. “When we compare ourselves to the industry, we are lower in water and energy consumption than our peers. Respecting the planet and being sustainable [are] part of our DNA. … This is a high pride for us, and we have designed this new mill to meet this expectation as well.”

Success through cooperation

Pelletier mentions the cooperation between Cascades and Valmet while designing the Bear Island project, saying open discussions and collaborative execution contributed significantly to the success of the conversion.

Gendron acknowledges the project was not without its challenges. However, he is satisfied with the machine’s ramp-up and the quality of the product.

Fine-tuning at the mill continues, but Cascades produces good-quality board at Bear Island, and customers are happy, prompting Valmet and Cascades to consider the mill conversion project a success.

The article was submitted by Valmet of Finland. For additional information, visit the Valmet website or the Cascades website.