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Atlantic Packaging’s lightweight paper “will be a game-changer”

A multi-million dollar upgrade of Atlantic Packaging’s Whitby mill has allowed the company to introduce SmartCorr, a new high-performance, lightweight 100% recycled paper (liner and medium). SmartCorr can be used to manufacture high performance corrugated packaging products that will be lighter, stronger and more sustainable.

According to a story in Canadian Packaging magazine’s May 2013 issue, the rebuild of the Whitby newsprint machine will eventually produce 1,100 tonnes per day of the lightweight, high-performance paper. The feedstock is 100% old corrugated container (OCC) fibres.

“This new SmartCorr will be a game-changer in the North American corrugated industry,” Atlantic Packaging’s president, David Boles, told Canadian Packaging. “Quite simply, this is not the kind of product they can get anywhere else.

“We are the only ones to make what I would dare call a truly revolutionary product—at least in the context of a rather stagnant corrugating industry that has so far not really delivered the sort of breakthrough technological innovation that its customers have been demanding in recent years,” says Boles.

“SmartCorr is the first true lightweight recycled paper available in North America—offering customers sustainability and strength characteristics unlike anything available in the market today,” he continues.

Boles says the equipment traditionally employed in a newsprint mill makes it an ideal site for the production of lightweight recycled paper production, “with some upgrades and alterations of course.” (Read the full Canadian Packaging story here.)

Atlantic Packaging promotional materials state that, in North America, recycled paper grades typically range from 23 lbs to 69 lbs, while ‘lightweight’ grades are considered anything under 35 lbs. SmartCorr paper will not only be available as high performance standard paper grades that allow customers to reduce their packaging, they will also be available as high performance grades below 23 lbs,

Atlantic Packaging attributes the strength of SmartCorr to several factors: the use of high quality old corrugated containers (OCC) and specialized equipment at the Whitby mill. “We’ve utilized European technology in the rebuild of our new mill, allowing us to add an organic surface agent to the paper, giving it exceptional strength and performance characteristics,” reads the SmartCorr flyer. “The technology in the Whitby Mill allows Atlantic to manufacture recycled paper using 20 – 30% less fibre, making SmartCorr the most sustainable recycled paper product in North America.”