Klabin to build pilot mill complex for research of Bioproducts
Investment represents another important step in strengthening the company’s Research, Development and Innovation area.
Klabin, Brazil’s leading producer and exporter of packaging paper and the country’s only company to offer hardwood, softwood and fluff pulp from a single industrial unit entirely designed for this purpose, announces that a US$ 7.77 million investment was approved for its research and development program, involving the construction of a Pilot Mill Complex, at the Monte Alegre Unit, in Telêmaco Borba (Paraná).
It is a project that will allow for the simulation of a mill where studies and tests will be conducted in research fields such as microfibrillated pulp (MFC), which will be incorporated to the company’s paper production lines, increasing the quality and resistance of Klabin products, and lignin, in this case for commercial purposes, enabling the company to enter new markets for renewable and sustainable products. Klabin, because of its diversified wood base, has lignin from pine, eucalyptus and the mixing of both species, providing unique products to the market.
Last year, the company inaugurated a modern Technology Center able to produce a broad range of forestry products and run simulations of the mills’ production lines, anticipating trends and developing technologies and sustainable applications.
“All activities in our Technology Center are on a laboratory scale. Just over a year after its inauguration, we achieved a level of development maturity that makes it necessary to produce some materials on a larger scale, enabling prolonged industrial tests. That gave rise to the need to create a Pilot Mill Complex, which should be operational in the fourth quarter of 2019,” explained Francisco Razzolini, Klabin’s Industrial Technology, Innovation, Sustainability and Pulp Business Officer.
Klabin also announced this year the acquisition of a 12.5% interest in the Israeli startup Melodea Bio Based Solutions, a pioneer in the technology for extracting cellulose nanocrystalline (CNC), a 100% biobased and renewable product. “The Pilot Mill Complex reinforces our focus on the development of bioeconomical solutions that value the responsible, efficient and sustainable use of resources,” says Razzolini.
