Page 22 - Georgia Forestry - Issue 2 - Spring 2023

Self-Sufficient
Manufacturing
Graphic Packaging International has seen success with using biomass to power its operations. In 2010, the com- pany approved an $80 million plan that included a high-efficiency biomass boiler and a 40-megawatt turbine generator to expand its use of biomass energy in its Macon paperboard mill.
“The project was initially started as a way to reduce our carbon footprint, and we saw an opportunity to use some untapped renewable resources that we had not used in the past,” said Heather Dummitt, technical services manager at Graphic Packaging International’s Macon mill. “I see the investment, and I know we’re doing it for the right reasons, not because we have to.”
In the harvesting process, limbs and tops of trees are often underutilized due to a lack of markets for the product. The Graphic Packaging International team quickly jumped on the opportunity to chip wood waste and use it to power its plant. The company has continued to expand its fuel source, using sawmill
and municipal yard waste.
“The downside of a biomass boiler is
that it is more expensive to install than a gas or coal fire boiler; there is more initial capital involved,” Dummitt said. “When you look at the pros of it, you can reduce greenhouse emissions, it is renewable and sustainable, we’re able to reduce our carbon footprint ... and it does reduce the wood waste going to landfills.”
The company uses between 1,300 and 1,350 tons of biomass daily and has elim- inated more than 200,000 tons of green- house gas emissions yearly.
200,000
TONS OF GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS ARE ELIMINATED YEARLY BY GRAPHIC PACKAGING USING BIOMASS POWER
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