How can high-quality consumer packaging materials from renewable fibers be made as efficiently and sustainably as possible?
This is an area Stora Enso has worked on for decades. With the launch of its new consumer board production line at the Oulu Mill in 2025, the company is taking yet another leap in finding the most advanced technological solutions to ensure the perfect combination of quality and efficiency for its packaging materials customers.
This time, the results will especially benefit customers in the food packaging industry, as the production line will be specialised for high-quality food and beverage packaging materials.
Here's a look at the advanced technology utilised at the Oulu Mill, and how it benefits customers looking for food packaging based on renewable materials.
1. Lighter packaging with fiber treatment innovation FiberLight TecTM
One of the latest technological innovations for renewable packaging material is Stora Enso’s patented FiberLight TecTM fiber treatment technology, which helps customers gain material efficiency and thus lower carbon emissions for the final packaging.
The technology is already in use in Stora Enso’s Performa Light folding carton, and is now being expanded to materials for food packaging with the launch of Performa Nova, a new premium light weight folding carton that will be produced at Oulu Mill’s new production line.
Simply put, FiberLight TecTM helps to create lighter boards that have excellent strength and stiffness properties, but with less raw material used.
“The board becomes more than 5 percent lighter than it would be without the treatment”, explains Malin E. Strömberg, Technical Product Manager & Product Development Manager at Stora Enso. “This, of course benefits our customers, as their packaging becomes lighter, which means they can produce same amount of packaging with less material and lower emissions, also during transport.”
How exactly the FiberLight TecTM treatment works is patented and not revealed in detail, but Strömberg explains that it has to do with different fiber layers.
“We use chemithermomechanical pulp (CTMP) and microfibrillated cellulose (MFC), which gives the board strength. When the different plies of the board come together, we can achieve the right stiffness and bulkiness, with less fiber used. This way we can offer strong but light board with great material efficiency for our customers.”
2. Reduced CO2 footprint with energy and material efficient state-of-the-art production line
Beyond an innovative fiber treatment technology, Stora Enso has made strong investments in making the consumer board production at the Oulu Mill as resource efficient as possible.
The new production line, which will be the most competitive folding box board machine in Europe, is planned to enable optimal production efficiency while meeting the high environmental standards, like excellent heat recovery.
To achieve the high production volume, Stora Enso and its technology provider have developed a tailor-made concept that maximises material efficiency along the entire paperboard machine. The concept enables flexibility and great production output at the highest quality level, while minimising energy use. The result is top product boards with excellent stiffness, outstanding smoothness and printability.
When completed, the new, state-of-the-art production line in Oulu will have very low CO2 emissions and low water usage, coupled with high resource efficiency. Thus, it can provide customers with reliable a supply of light-weight and high quality renewable and recyclable food packaging materials.
