Metso Paper to deliver digesters to Zellstoff Stendal pulp mill in Germany

Published Apr 5, 2005 15.00.00 +2 GMT

The most modern pulp mill in Europe, the Zellstoff Stendal Mill in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany, will optimize its operation by expanding the cooking process with two additional SuperBatch digesters, delivered by Metso Paper. This will facilitate more flexibility in producing special pulp qualities and in using varying wood raw material. When needed, the expansion also enables the mill to increase its annual production from the current 550,000 tonnes. The total value of the order is approximately EUR 6 million. The new digesters will be taken into stream by the end of this year.

The Stendal mill, first taken into operation in August 2004, produces fully bleached softwood market pulp. Metso Paper supplied the entire pulping process from wood handling up to baling of the finished pulp. The current SuperBatch cooking process comprises eight 400-m3 digesters.

The additional investment was decided only six months after the initial start-up and the cooking plant expansion was taken into account already in the original construction plan. RWE Industrie-Lösungen GmbH, Duisburg, Germany, the general contractor of the main project, will execute the new project, too.

Besides featuring easy capacity increase, the SuperBatch process is well known of its ability to accept varying chip qualities, while producing high quality pulp especially for reinforcement purposes. After the completion of the expansion project, these features will give a special advantage to Zellstoff Stendal. The mill will be able to run with full design production even with lower cost wood raw material than originally specified. Furthermore, the SuperBatch cooking enables flexible production of tailor-made qualities.

Mercer International Inc. is the main owner of both Zellstoff Stendal and the Rosenthal pulp mill in Germany. Metso's pulping and process automation technology is widely applied also in the Rosenthal mill. The Stendal project positioned Mercer among the largest bleached softwood market pulp suppliers in the world.

More information: Seppo Hiljanen, Senior Vice President, Chemical Pulping Tel. +358 20 482 9881, seppo.hiljanen@metso.com