Transforming Wood Fibre into Future Products: Innovations in Pulp Technology

1. Wood-fibre for future products from pulp Paul Kibblewhite

2. Wood-fibre for papermakingThe next 10 – 20 years

3. Fibre property interrelationships Wall area  Coarseness Number  1/(wall area x length) Width/thickness = Fibre collapse (in dried sheet) Perimeter/wall thickness  1/(Wood density)  Collapse

4. Softwood versus Hardwood fibres

5. Furnish mix components • Softwood fibres for reinforcement, runnability and robustness • Hardwood fibres for bulk, surface & optical properties, and formation

6. Eucalypt fibre selection for papermaking • Plantation-grown species, hybrids and clones • Short crop rotations at 5+ years • Chip density about 550 kg/m³ • High kraft pulp yield • Target fibre coarseness, length and collapse resistance • Target sheet bulk and tensile strength

7. Globulus a premium eucalypt fibre-type

8. Where to in short-term? • Conventional breeding and propagation technologies • Short crop rotations • High forest productivity and disease resistance • Emphasis on low cost, rapid propagation procedures, and screening tools • Genetic modification of lower priority

9. Softwood fibre-types

10. Softwood pulp uniformity by fibre-type

11. Northern is the premium softwood fibre-type • Low coarseness • long and slender • High number • Low MFA • High hemicelluloses • Low refining energy • Long crop rotations

12. Northern fibre-type from radiata pineHow Do? • Wood/chip segregation • Pulp fractionation • Conventional breeding, hybridisation and cloning • Genetic modification

13. Market kraft categories through wood/chip segregation

14. “Rods and Ribbons”Pulp fractionation by fibre collapse

15. Breeding for fibre quality Select for Low Fibre Coarseness while retaining or increasing Density and Length

16. CoarsenessWood-fibre number

17. Radiata pine fibre improvements in the short-term Wood/chip segregation • Further advances limited Pulp fractionation by fibre collapse • Yet to be achieved Genetic modification, and breeding for low coarseness • Pulp mill is a residue user • “Change” required for pulpwood regimes and fibre quality improvement

18. Pulp-fibre for papermaking 50 years on!Who Knows? Today’s commodities • Tissue, sanitary and packaging products, possibly OK • Junk-mail, newsprint, communication and hard-copy, probably limited? Today’s specialty cement reinforcement pulp?

19. Wood-fibre for future bio-products from pulp:A 50-year horizon

20. Softwood and Eucalypt-type pulp-fibre 50 years on • Short rotation pulpwood regimes (5 – 10 years) • Highly uniform fibre property populations • Earlywood- and latewood-type pulps • Wide range of chemical and physical fibre-property combinations

21. Many possible fibre property combinations1. Separate EW & LW fibre populations

22. 2. Low or high coarseness rod-like fibre populations

23. 3. Four plus fibre-property combinations for future products from pulp

24. Fibre property combinations Designer fibres through Purpose-grown, short-rotation crops for Sustainable designer products

25. Fibre-property-combination research Genetic modification A critical success requirement • Assay procedures to screen genotypes at the plantlet stage (3 months?)

26. Back to Reality! Who pays? • Fibre-property-combination research and development • Product identification processes • Fibre property combination selection and supply • Product development Constraints • Costs • Sustainability, and product- and market-driven • Green-house effect