Pulp and paper industry

by one of the largest paper and lumber products companies in the world. For the most part, union relations have been stable at the local mill. However, in recent years, the parent company had been demanding continuous cost reductions and productivity improvements across the entire company. These efforts had hit the local mill hard, resulting in many layoffs. In the last two years, the parent company has spent over $100 million on new technologies for making "fluff pulp". Such pulp is used for baby diapers, disposable wipes, absorbent materials, cleaning supplies, etc. While these are growing markets, the basic product is a difficult to differentiate commodity. This means the local mill must always be looking for ways to cut costs, improve productivity and improve the quality of its products. The mill always has to be concerned about the selling price of its pulp and paper. If other companies beat them on price, they can lose business fairly quickly. To be profitable the local mill must run at about a 95% utilization rate. It basically never shuts down except for brief required maintenance periods. With the productivity enhancements, the local mill was "down-sized" from 1200 employees to about 900 over the last three years prior to the current wood yard reengineering…

EXTRACTION Raw materials: The three main sources for pulp production are recycled paper, trees (soft and hard wood) and byproducts (ex. wood chips, saw dusts, etc.). The logs are debarked, and some are chipped down and both are delivered to the pulp industry for conversion. Water is also required throughout the process in great quantity. PRIMARY PRODUCTION (Pulping) Logs, recycled papers, and byproducts are delivered to pulp industries where they go through the process of being turned into…

Exhibit 1 for material costs associated with each product, or grade.) Thus, unit level (or volume-related) drivers made sense for applying certain types of overhead to products. However, other important costs were incurred without respect to volume. For example, grade changes induce instabilities into the manufacturing process that result in scrap until the process resumes stability. On average, production engineers estimate that approximately one-half reel is lost to scrap each time a grade…

Postal Service’s priority flat rate envelope is the envelope that made from post-consumer waste, such as disposable cardboard and paper plates. USPS claims that its envelops meet the Cradle to cradle certification, which is a certification given by Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institution1. The core value of the cradle to cradle standard is to utilize safe materials in a continuous and environmentally sustainable way. The institution designed and is continuing to refresh the cradle to…

Assignment 1: Strategic Management and Competitive Strategies Introduction The industry I have chosen for this assignment is the paper/forestry products industry. I have been working in this industry for nearly thirteen years and have extensive knowledge of the industry as a whole. The organization I will focus on is Domtar, my current employer. Domtar is “the largest North American manufacturer of uncoated freesheet communication papers” (Domtar. n.d.a). Domtar Corporation began in 1848 when…

During the period between the end of the First World War and the beginning of the Second World War, many challenges were facing the region. In the twelfth chapter of the text, Atlantic Canada: A History, authors Hiller and Conrad cover the economic crisis and adaptations to mass consumer culture within the Maritimes and Newfoundland during this period. This chapter explores the economic struggle of the Maritimes during this time, and the troubles that the Maritimes, Newfoundland and the First…

many rocks and is the main component of the mineral cinnabar. Natural background levels can be detected in soils, living organisms, air, and water around the world. Mercury is still used today in a wide variety of products and processes. It is used (although with less and less frequency) in the paper and pulp industries, batteries, thermometers, fluorescent lights, in some vaccines, and…

problems, even death. In United States coal pollutants contribute to the four of the five leading severe diseases; heart diseases, cancers, stroke and lower respiratory disorders. 1.3. Sources of Xenobiotics 1.3.1. Direct sources Waste water and solid residual releases from the industries are major direct sources of xenobiotics. These industries can be pharmaceutical, plastics, paper and pulp, textiles, pesticides…

Environmental Issues Waste water generation: The wastewater produced during the chemical processes contains high concentration of chemicals such as bisulfites, sodium carbonate, sodium hydroxide, sodium sulfide, chlorine dioxide, hydrochloric acid, calcium oxide etc which is potentially unsafe to purge directly into the environment. Sludge by waste water treatment: The significant solid wastes such as lime mud, lime slaker grits, green liquor dregs, boiler and furnace ash, scrubber sludges,…

bags were in the economy: From the 1960s on, the company had pursued an aggressive policy on polyethylene packaging patents and by 1977 was producing its own bags. Plastic grocery bags were introduced in America in 1979; Kroger and Safeway had picked them up in 1982. But relatively few stores were using them. In 1985, the Society of Plastic Engineers's Newark Section held its regional conference at the Holiday Inn in Somerset, New Jersey. The topic was "New materials and profits in grocery sacks…