By Joanne Potter, Editorial Director, International News, RISI
BRUSSELS, Aug. 28, 2008 - It’s not quite the Olympics, but for the past five years I’ve been surveying the industry annually to find out which are the fastest paper machines around the globe. The idea sprang from a few press releases announcing records, which got me wondering what the top PM speeds were for various types of paper and board.
The latest survey has just been completed and some familiar themes have emerged. Europeans have dominated the rankings from the get-go, but since 2003 we can see the rise of the Asians. A raft of investments in that region in recent years has propelled several Asian producers up the charts and they remain a significant presence.
The North Americans are still scarce, though, reflecting the lack of capital investment in new machinery there. Latin America and Africa again do not feature in the rankings. Things would likely be different in a pulp survey, however, with huge amounts of new capacity coming online in Latin America in particular in recent years.
There are a couple of new entries in the 2008 chart, in the newsprint, uncoated fine paper and containerboard categories. And some machines have improved on their previous personal bests.
In the newsprint sector, the fastest PM has surpassed the 2,000-m/min mark, the first time a graphic paper machine has run above this speed for 24 hours. In 2006 Myllykoski was the first to break through this barrier, on PM 1 at its Rhein Papier mill in Germany, but it only managed to operate at 2,010 m/min for several hours. However, just last month Papierfabrik Palm ran at a record 2,005 m/min on PM 3 at its Eltmann plant, also in Germany, this time for more than 24 hours.
The biggest machine in the survey remains PM 3 at Gold East Paper’s Dagang mill in China, with a whopping 700,000 tonnes/yr of coated fine paper capacity. However, in years to come this may be upstaged by a new machine planned by another APP China subsidiary, Hainan Jinhai Pulp & Paper. The company aims to start up another new coated woodfree paper unit, PM 2, at its Hainan plant in China next May. This behemoth is set to churn out an astonishing 1 million tonnes/yr of paper.
Some more speed milestones may be passed by the time of the next survey, though. One European containerboard machine surveyed is only marginally short of hitting 1,600 m/min, and perhaps a Chinese cartonboard unit will overcome the 1,000-m/min barrier in that sector.
But who is the Usain Bolt of the paper world this year? Check out this article from PPI Europe to find out!
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