Norske Skog has commissioned its recycled corrugated case material machine at the Golbey mill in France. The PM has a capacity of 550,000 tpy of recycled corrugated case material. The company reports that deliveries to customers will start during the second quarter of 2025. Capacity utilisation is expected to reach 50-60 per cent towards the end of 2025 and full utilisation of 95 per cent during the first half of 2027.
The company had started conversion of the former newsprint machine in the fourth quarter of 2022. The total investment for the project was now put at €400m. At full capacity utilisation, the Golbey mill is expected to generate annual revenues of around NOK5bn (€435m) in 2027/28.
This new machine further expands Norske Skog's presence in the packaging paper market which it entered only in 2023. First intentions to enter this market were officially expressed by the company in 2020. The newsprint machine at the Bruck site in Austria was the first of two machines to be converted to containerboard production. This machine is smaller than the one in Golbey, with a capacity of 210,000 tpy of recycled corrugated case material, and started commercial production in May 2023.
The Golbey paper mill houses a second machine, which has continued producing newsprint. It has a capacity of 330,000 tpy.
Norske Skog's packaging paper stilled recorded losses in the first quarter of the year. The division's operating loss stood at NOK67m (around €5.8m). However, the company attributed this mainly to fixed costs of NOK60-65m being shifted from the publication paper to the packaging paper division, given the conversion of the PM in Golbey. In general, Norske Skog was satisfied with the performance of the sector. The containerboard machine in Bruck is reportedly nearing full capacity, with deliveries in the first quarter amounting to 48,000 t. Full capacity is expected to be reached during the first half of the year.
