Xylem, the US-based water technology provider, announced that it will deliver a Wedeco ozone plant for the new pulp mill LD Celulose in Brazil, a joint venture between Lenzing and Duratex in which Lenzing holds a 51 percent, Duratex a 49 percent stake. LD Celulose will have the capacity to produce 500,000 tons of dissolving wood pulp per year and represents an investment of US$ 1.3 billion. Dissolving pulp is pure cellulose derived from wood processing and is used as the key raw material to manufacture textile and specialty fibers. These sustainable fibers are an excellent substitute for instance to non-biodegradable oil-based fibers such as polyester.
The Wedeco plant will deliver 7.2 tons of ozone per day. Xylem’s Wedeco ozone technology will help the new mill produce dissolving wood pulp without the use of chlorine-based bleaching chemicals and so ensuring the lowest environmental footprint possible. Ozone will be produced on-site using oxygen and green electricity generated from bio-mass byproducts of the pulping process.
Hans Gröstlinger, Technical Director Pulp & Wood at Lenzing said :
“Lenzing currently uses ozone bleaching technology in its Austrian and Czech pulp mills. In both cases the Wedeco ozone plants with latest technology show expected and defined performance. Based on this good experience, Lenzing and Duratex decided to select Xylem also for LD Celulose.”
Manufactured and tested in Germany at Xylem’s Herford facility, the Wedeco ozone system will be tailored to meet the highest industry standards at low operating costs. Wedeco’s unmatched technology delivers full ozone capacity in less than 2 minutes from start-up and adjusts ozone production automatically to demand within seconds. It enables precise ozone dosing in the flexible pulp bleaching process.
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