Continuous Batch Fiber Recovery - An Economical Alternative, 1995 Recycling Symposium Proceedings
Daniel B. Mulligan
HNTB Corporation
Dana Watson
Nobby’s ABF
Chris Kulakowski
Pellerin Milnor
In responding to the increased emphasis to produce recycled content paper and paper products, members of the paper industry are facing difficult capital and operating decision. while the recent equipment developments provide solutions to recycling obstacles, they also increase capital requirements for the fiber recovery system. Companies are faced with decisions when selecting and comparing deinking options that seem to come down to either higher capital cost with lower operating expenses or lower capital costs with higher operating expenses. In either case the return on investment, ROI, is diminished and the decision difficult. What is needed, to rapidly move paper recycling forward, is a system that results in significantly lower capital cost and lower operating expenses.
Recent application of a more economical and related process technology has been successful in recovering fiber from various classifications of recovered paper materials. A new “continuous batch fiber recovery system” has been developed which uniquely combines the individual stages of deinking technology, pulping through bleaching. The results indicate the potential for excellent recycled fiber quality while reducing energy consumption and equipment requirements. The initial trials focused on deinking newspapers and resulted in a 62 brightness and a 35 ppm dirt count from the processed materials. The “continuous batch” technology is a connected modular system which provides for individualized process control of each module, controlled consistency transfers, and the elimination of most pumps and pipes to transfer fiber within the immediate direct system.
This paper will discuss the development of this process and the equipment. It will also include relative comparisons to capital costs and construction schedules.