New Power and Pulp Conversion Plant Planned for Idled Mill in Quebec

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Fortress Specialty Cellulose Incorporated, a subsidiary of Fortress Paper Limited (Vancouver, British Columbia), plans to breathe new life into an idled pulp mill in Thurso, Quebec, with an infusion of more than $153 million toward capital improvements.

Fortress recently acquired the mill from Fraser Papers (Toronto, Ontario) for $3 million and plans to convert to mill from kraft pulp production to dissolving pulp. Plans also include the addition of a 25-megawatt (MW) cogeneration plant on the mill site. The plant will be designed to produce 200,000 tons of air-dried, dissolving pulp annually, which will be sold mainly to the rayon market.

Fortress will invest $91 million to convert the mill to dissolving-grade cellulose. The Thurso mill shut down in June 2009 and will require cooking reconfigurations, recausticising system upgrades, and upgrades to the bleaching systems and drying systems, including a Flakt dryer and layboy, debottlenecking to the black liquor recovery boiler, and a new process controls system.

Fortress' $62 million plans for the power plant include a new 25-MW steam turbine generator, new high pressure biomass boiler, upgrades to existing biomass-handling systems and feedwater systems, and the addition of a cooling tower.

Fortress plans to execute major components of the project on a turnkey basis.

Construction on the conversion project will commence between the second and third quarter of this year, with plans to produce dissolving-grade cellulose by mid-year 2011. Construction on the power plant is slated for 2011 with startup anticipated in 2012.

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