SINGAPORE, Aug. 12, 2008 (RISI) - Japanese giant Oji Paper has picked Voith Paper to supply a coated woodfree paper machine for its greenfield mill in Nantong city, Jiangsu province, China. Startup is scheduled for mid-2010.
Voith will build the complete production unit from the stock preparation line up to the rewinder. The 8.2 m wide machine, PM 1, will have a capacity of 400,000 tonnes/yr. The supplier will also provide an off-machine coater with four blade coaters, two Janus off-line calendars and two winders, as well as piping, tanks and pumps. All equipment will be supplied from Voith factories in Germany, Japan and China. Siemens will provide electrical equipment and drive systems for the PM and its ancillary installations.
Construction work for the mill has already begun. Oji Paper aims to install a 700,000 tonne/yr bleached hardwood kraft (BHK) pulp line at the plant, making it an integrated pulp and paper facility. The BHK line is due to come on stream in 2011.
A second 400,000 tonne/yr coated woodfree paper machine, PM 2, is penciled in for startup in 2015. In the meantime, the group intends to sell the surplus BHK produced at the plant from 2011.
Oji Paper has set up a sales company Oji Paper Trading (China), which will import mainly the group’s products from Japan into China to develop markets there and establish a sales network. Following the startup of PM1, it will only sell output from the new plant. The sales outfit is 90% owned by Oji Paper, with fellow Japanese companies Japan Pulp and Paper and Kokusai Pulp & Paper each holding a 5% share.
The new plant is operated by Jiangsu Oji Paper, of which Oji Paper owns 90%, and the Chinese state-held Nantong Economic and Technological Development Zone Corporation, which holds the remaining 10%.
