Engineers See Major Paper Mill Savings With New Rotor Technology

No Pulp Fiction: Engineers See Major Paper Mill Savings With New Rotor Technology
By Brian Lin with files from Erinrose Handy

A partnership between UBC, government and the pulp and paper industry has resulted in the development of three high efficiency pulp screen rotors that produce high quality paper while reducing almost half the energy required.

“There are currently 300 pulp screens in British Columbia’s 20 pulp and paper mills,” says UBC Mechanical Engineering Assoc. Prof. James Olson. “The industry consumes almost 20 per cent of all the electricity produced in the province and pulp screening is an energy intensive operation in that process.”

Pulp screens work somewhat like the spin cycle in a household washing machine by rotating at high speeds and forcing pulp through narrow openings in the screen. Pulp screens in B.C. alone consume 300 Gigawatt Hours per year at an estimated cost of $16 million -- or enough energy to light up 15,000 homes.

Olson and fellow UBC engineers Carl Ollivier-Gooch and Mark Martinez, along with industrial partners at Montreal-based Advanced Fiber Technologies Inc., took inspiration from aerospace technology and designed a family of uniquely shaped, hydrodynamic rotors that significantly reduce drag and operate at much lower speeds and power, while increasing the capacity and efficiency of the screen.

The technology was patented and licensed to Advanced Fiber Technologies and 100 new rotors were installed in 30 mills across Canada.

“The trial results were beyond everyone’s expectations -- reducing electricity consumption by 52 per cent compared to current state-of-the-art rotors,” says Olson. “If all pulp screens used in B.C. mills were converted to the new rotor technology, an estimated $8 million could be saved each year. Adopted nation-wide, the industry could save $20 million a year.”

While the cost savings would increase the industry’s competitiveness against new paper producers such as China, the reduced energy usage also translates into lower greenhouse emissions. The new technology could also cement Canada’s leadership in pulp equipment manufacturing and further diversify a sector that currently logs $53 billion in sales and $44 billion in exports per year.

As a result of the success in the mill trials, the research team has won BC Hydro’s New Technology of the Year Award (2007), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC)’s Synergy Award for Partnership and Innovation (2007), and the British Columbia Innovations Council’s Lieutenant Governor’s Award (2008).

The work has also led to a $2.2 million investment from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and a partnership with 11 industry partners including BC Hydro and most of the paper mills in B.C.

“There’s a gap between electricity supply and demand in B.C. and we need to do more to conserve power,” says Lisa Coltart, BC Hydro’s director of Power Smart. “We’re excited to contribute to research that will provide substantial energy savings while making the province a world leader in the field.”

From Bad To Worse: Newspapers' Circ Declines

From Bad To Worse: Newspapers' Circ Declines
by Erik Sass, Tuesday, May 1, 2007 8:00 AM ET
http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.san&s=59553&Nid=29924&p=204904


AMERICA'S FLAGSHIP NEWSPAPERS ARE STILL afloat, but their crews may want to don swimsuits soon. The Audit Bureau of Circulations posted numbers Monday showing that in the six months ending March 2007, total daily circulation fell 2.1% to 44,961,066. Sunday circ fell 3.1% to 48,102,437, compared to the same period last year.


The ABC FAS-FAX numbers follow a litany of bad industry news over the last few weeks, including weak first-quarter earnings from leading newspaper companies, and a decline in the housing market, with ominous implications for newspaper classifieds.

This marks the 17th straight year of decline for both weekday and Sunday circs; this is an industry in distress. Indeed, the latest ABC FAS-FAX numbers look almost identical to previous figures, released biannually in what has become a grim drumbeat of contraction. In the September 2006 report, daily circ fell 2.8% as Sunday circ dropped 3.4%; in March 2006 they fell 2.5% and 3.1%, respectively; September 2005, 2.6% and 3.1%; and March 2005, 1.9% and 2.5%.

As in previous years, big metro dailies took some of the biggest hits, with The New York Times down 1.9%, the Los Angeles Times down 4.2% to 815,723, The Washington Post down 3.5% to 699,130, Chicago Tribune down 2.1% to 566,827, Houston Chronicle down 2% to 504,114, Dallas Morning News down 14.3% to 411,919, the San Francisco Chronicle down 2.9%, Long Island's Newsday down 6.9% to 398,231, and The Boston Globe down 3.7% to 382,503.

These figures actually contain (relatively) good news for some of the big titles, as their percentage rate of decline appears to be slowing. In the September 2006 ABC report, the New York Times' daily circ was down 3.5%, Los Angeles Times 8%, San Francisco Chronicle 5.3% and The Boston Globe 6.7%. On the other hand, losses accelerated slightly at the Chicago Tribune and The Washington Post, increasing by about half a percentage point.

In this gloomy environment, publications that hold their own are success stories: USA Today's circ is up 0.5% and The Wall Street Journal grew 0.6%. The biggest standouts were New York City's two daily tabloids, as the New York Daily News grew 1.4% to 718,174, and the New York Post jumped a remarkable 7.6% to 724,748.

In recent weeks, the nation's biggest newspaper companies have posted weak first-quarter results, citing revenue declines due to Internet competition. In the first quarter of 2007, the New York Times Company saw print ad revenue decline 3.4%, compared to the same period last year, as total profit fell 9.9% to $54.5 million. At the Tribune Company, overall operating revenues slipped 4% to $1.2 billion and operating profit was down 16% to $181 million. Gannett saw total revenues decline slightly from $1.88 billion in 2006 to $1.87 billion in 2007, as net income fell from $235.3 million in first quarter 2006 to $210.6 million in 2007, a roughly 10.5% drop.