Stora Enso's major project is confirmed. After a feasibility study launched last year the paper group is launching a ?1 billion investment to convert the paper machine at its Oulu site in Finland into a board line. This line, with a total capacity of 750,000 tons of cardboard, should start up at the beginning of 2025.
"This investment represents a step change in the European market and will develop our Oulu facility into a mega-site, improving the profitability and competitiveness of our consumer and boxboard offerings. The converted line will be the most competitive FBB machine in Europe, which will also allow us to optimize production at other sites to unlock additional growth." the company has a long history of innovation in the packaging industry," says Hannu Kasurinen, executive vice president and head of the Packaging Materials Division, in a statement.
By 2021, Stora Enso had converted the other machine at the Oulu site from paper production to kraftliner. The remaining second line was unused. After the conversion, it will produce folding boxboard (FBB) and coated unbleached kraft (CUK) with a total annual capacity of 750,000 tons of board.
800 million euros in sales thanks to this conversion
Stora Enso targets the food and beverage packaging markets, particularly frozen and chilled, and the dry food and fast food markets, mainly in Europe and North America.
At full capacity, this production line is expected to add 800 million euros of revenue to the groupâ??s sales of 10.2 billion euros by 2021.
The restart of this line will create approximately 300 direct and 1,500 indirect jobs. The wood consumption of the new line will be about one million m 3 of pulpwood.
"Renewable packaging continues to be our largest strategic growth area. It is also a market that is growing faster than plastic-based solutions for the first time. With this conversion, we can leverage existing assets for rapid and cost-effective time-to-market compared to other investment opportunities. This puts us in a very good position to drive revenue growth and gain market share." says Annica Bresky, President and CEO of Stora Enso.
