The logs delivered to the sawmills are cut optimally in the forest according to customer needs and final products. This ensures a high-quality end product and that not even a splinter of valuable raw material goes to waste.
The sawmill processes the logs into planks and boards. Bark, chips, and sawdust generated during production are valuable by-products. The bark produced as a by-product is used as biofuel, the chips are directed as raw material for pulp, and the sawdust can, for example, be compressed into pellets and used for fuel.
“Mechanical wood processing is a method that does not itself produce waste. The energy production required by the sawmills creates ash, which can be used as fertiliser and in construction,” explains Metsä Group’s Environmental Manager Jenni Kukkonen.
Networks and cooperation with parties that utilise ash have been good, and all the ash has been put to use for more than ten years. Rauma sawmill does not have its own power plant, but instead receives its needed energy from the pulp mill located on the same site, meaning no ash is generated at Rauma sawmill.
No process waste to landfill – other waste is carefully sorted
The sawmills also generate waste from supporting processes and timber packaging. Maintenance and servicing of machines and equipment produce waste, such as oily hydraulic hoses. People also produce waste in offices and social facilities.
“Sawmills have effective waste sorting practices, and waste streams such as metal, plastic, and cardboard are collected separately and sent for recycling,” says Kukkonen.
In practice, only individual exceptional waste batches, such as those arising from demolition work, end up in landfill as anything other than process waste.