Energy Extraction Plaster Rock Fires Up A more than 100-year-old sawmill in Atlantic Canada has a new lease on life thanks in part to a project that will see its energy costs plummet. By Bill Tice wick secure its future. Employees at the Plaster Rock dimension lumber mill, which is owned by Fraser Papers and located in the small town of Plaster Rock, fired up the new equipment in mid-November of 2009. At a cost of about $10.5 million, the en- A ergy system accounted for the biggest por- tion of an almost $18-million investment Fraser Papers made in the facility. But it hasn’t been an easy ride for the company. The upgrade project had been approved in the fall of 2008; the last log was processed on February 13, 2009, prior to the upgrade work starting. But everything came to a screeching halt four months later in June 2009, when Fraser Papers went into credi- tor protection. It would be an additional five months before the mill would produce another stick of lumber. “When we went into creditor protec- tion, we had already gutted most of the brand new biomass powered ener- gy system is helping a long-stand- ing sawmill in western New Bruns- sawmill, we had started work on the energy project, and re- ally nothing was operational except for the planer mill,” explains Paul McKinley, gen- eral manager of lumbermill operations for Fraser Papers. “At that point, there was no turning back if we wanted to run again. We had to finish the work in progress.” The mill site and the proj- ect sat idle for approximately two months while Fraser Papers negotiated a repay- able loan from the Province of New Brunswick. Securing the government financing was enough to get things rolling again; however, the markets were not so kind. Lumber prices and demand were still low, meaning that even if they could start up earlier, produc- ing lumber would probably be a money-losing proposition. “With the lumber markets the way they were, it worked in our favour to take our time with the project,” explains McKinley. “The good news is, that allowed us to complete this project carefully and safely, employ many of our own previously laid-off em- ployees to do the installation labour, fin- ish the project without incurring overtime costs, and re-open when we thought the timing was right.” The KMW combustor at Plaster Rock is an improved Scandinavian design with moveable step grates. back to Work Once the work resumed, a team of 25 to 30 people, including the mill’s entire main- Paul McKinley is general manager of lumbermill operations for Fraser Papers. 16 CanadianBIOMASS tenance team, some operators, and a few helpers, started erecting the boiler and other components in the energy system and began work on other parts of the project, which in- cluded two new dry kilns that are heated by the energy system, and upgrades in the saw- mill production process. On November 16, 2009 the sawmill officially started up again. By the time the planer mill was re-started in early December, about 140 people were back at work. Two shifts are now running, employing about 175 people. “These have been very tenuous times for us,” McKinley adds. “With the sup- port of our employees, the New Brunswick JANUARY/ FEBRUARY 2010
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