June 2015 - Midland Paper

Sun Chemical is Innovator of the Year in Stationers’ Awards

Sun Chemical’s SunJet division has won the Stationers’ Company overall Innovator of the Year Award for its low-migration inkjet ink, which is safe to use for food packaging. The firm beat off competition from 32 other finalists in the Innovation Excellence Awards, held at the Stationers' Hall yesterday, to win the top accolade. Its SunJet EtiJet UV inks for narrow-web and labels, and Amphora range for packaging, only contain materials that are on approved lists and comply with the Swiss Ordinance standard. The Stationers’ judges praised the formulation for “making food packaging more safe in the digital arena” and for its “novel chemistry to prevent the ingredients in packaging ink migrating into food”.

PEFC UK Launch New Online Certification Tool for UK Woodlands

The new online forest certification system aims to provide a simple and cost-effective solution to assist the UK’s small and medium-sized private forest owners to become PEFC-certified. The new tool is designed to help increase the UK’s certified forest area and boost the supply of certified material to the UK primary processing sector and its customers. The online tool was launched at a special Press Lunch in central London during a rare UK gathering of major figures from PEFC, including PEFC International Chairman, William Street, and CEO Ben Gunneberg, to discuss key issues surrounding the global forestry, construction, paper and packaging industries. While PEFC forest certification has been established in the UK for five years, it has long been recognized that a cost-effective certification solution was required to enable smaller woodland owners to participate in certification.

Postal Service to Debut Digital Mail in New York This Fall

In an attempt to cross over into the realm of digital marketing channels, the U.S. Postal Service will introduce an email preview of what's in people's mailboxes in New York this fall. Called Real Mail Notification (RMN), it will offer direct mailers interactive options to allow people to click through to websites or make purchases directly via email. Mail sorting machines already take pictures of the fronts of nearly every piece of letter mail to read their barcodes. The Postal Service saw this as a way to make link mail with a digital channel and make it more appealing to use in multichannel campaigns. Subscribers to the service receive 8 a.m. emails with pictures of the fronts of pieces that will be sitting in their mailboxes that evening.

Crofton Mill Resolves Operating Issues and Resumes Production

Catalyst Paper Corporation (TSX:CYT) today announced that due to operating issues that have been fully resolved, the Crofton mill has incurred production losses of approximately 8,600 tonnes of pulp and 8,600 tonnes of paper in the month of June. These production losses will not impact current customer orders but will reduce second quarter EBITDA approximately $5 to 6 million.

BPM Continues to Exceed AIB International’s Food Safety Standards

BPM Inc., a top provider of high quality flexible packaging for the food and confectionery industries, announced today that its production facility has received recognition of accomplishment for fulfilling the requirements of AIB International's Consolidated Standards for food safety. "AIB International has rigorous standards established for food safety and BPM works hard to meet and exceed all requirements. AIB is widely recognized in the industry for these types of inspections and audits," said Rod Wiltzius, Production Manager. "Customers want to know that proper procedures and assessments are in place to ensure cleanliness during the production process, and with AIB, customers can be assured of BPM’s commitment to food safety."

Oil Stocks Hit Two-Year High in Europe Hub

June 30, 2015
Midland Paperclips
Misc

The amount of crude stored at the world’s largest oil-trading hub has hit a two-year high, according to data released on Monday, in another sign that the world has an oversupply of petroleum that won’t end soon. Crude stocks reached 60.6 million barrels in June at a network of storage tanks in the Dutch ports of Amsterdam and Rotterdam and Belgium’s Antwerp, a hub known as ARA, according to Genscape. That is a record since the Louisville, Ky.-based information company started tracking ARA storage in 2013. The stocks have risen by 10 million barrels since April 3 alone, Genscape said.

Appleton Coated Announces Sales Partnership with New Leaf Paper for Reincarnation Coated Paper Line

Appleton Coated® has entered into an agreement with New Leaf Paper® to market and sell Reincarnation®, a coated paper line made from 100% post-consumer recovered fiber (PCRF). Made in the USA at Appleton Coated’s mill, New Leaf Reincarnation is the paper of choice for some of North America’s leading environmentally-aware brands. It is 100% PCRF coated paper with all fiber sourced within 100 miles of our mill, further reducing its environmental impact. It offers Forest Stewardship Council® certification (FSC® C007796). It is process chlorine free, pH neutral and archival. It is Lacey Act compliant, and 100% of the electricity used to manufacture it is offset with Green-e® certified renewable energy certificates (RECS). With 93 (GE) brightness and state-of-the-art coating technology it is the perfect combination of high quality, consistency, and sustainability. Reincarnation is offered in Matte, Dull, and Gloss finishes in a wide range of text and cover basis weights.

UPM showcases the Biofore Concept Car at ZELLCHEMING-Expo 2015

“Forests are no longer just a source of timber, paper and pulp. When we look at the forest we see so much more. We see new biomaterials, biofuels and an endless source for truly sustainable innovations,” says Bernd Eikens, Executive Vice President, UPM Paper ENA. The Biofore Concept Car demonstrates the use of UPM’s innovative bio-based materials in the automotive industry. The majority of components in the Biofore Concept Car that are traditionally made of plastic are replaced by renewable UPM Formi biocomposite and thermoformable UPM Grada wood material. This leads to a significant improvement of the overall environmental performance of car manufacturing. The Biofore Concept Car was designed and manufactured by students from the Helsinki Metropolia University of Applied Sciences.

Verso Addresses NYSE Continued Listing Standard

Verso Corporation (NYSE: VRS) announced today that the New York Stock Exchange has notified Verso that it has fallen below the NYSE's continued listing standard requiring that the average share price of Verso's common stock be at least $1.00 over a consecutive 30-trading-day period. As of June 24, 2015, the date of the NYSE notification, the average closing price of Verso's common stock over the past 30 consecutive trading days was $0.96 per share. Verso intends to regain compliance with the NYSE's continued listing standard by bringing the share price and the average share price of Verso's common stock back to at least $1.00 within the required period of six months after receipt of the NYSE notification, i.e., by December 24, 2015.

Resolute Selects State-of-the-Art Tissue Machine

Resolute Forest Products Inc. today announced the selection of a state-of-the-art tissue machine for the project at its Calhoun mill, in Tennessee. Supplied by Valmet, the Advantage New Tissue Technology (NTT) machine will produce premium quality tissue products for the consumer market. This machine is part of the previously announced $270 million project to build a facility to manufacture at-home, premium private label tissue paper, including bath and towel. Preparation work has begun at Calhoun, and the machine is expected to start making tissue in the first quarter of 2017.