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Cellulose filament makes the leap to commercial products

Kruger announced at the PacWest conference that its cellulose filament product, FiloCell, is now being used as an additive in two commercial applications within the paper industry. Balazs Tolnai, general manager, technology, made the announcement as he brought participants up to date on the progress of this all-Canadian biomaterial.

The PacWest conference takes place June 10-13 in Whister, B.C.

Kruger and FPInnovations solidified their partnership for the development of cellulose filament in Sept. 2013. Cellulose filament production at the pre-commercial plant in Trois-Rivières began in the first half of 2014.

As of June 2015, cellulose filament has two commercial applications, and has had two market pulp trials and 16 paper machine trials, as well as 20 dispersion trials. Tolnai says the fact that potential users can receive truckload quantities is quite an advantage, compared with other biomaterials that may still be only at the lab-scale or pilot phase. The Kruger plant achieved its target production level of 5 t/d in March 2015.

Tolnai said the material has been shown to reduce basis weight while maintaining tensile strength for some paper grades, and functions as a reinforcement for tissue grades.